Windows 7 - "Can't stop generic volume device because a program is still using it"

I've got an external hard drive...actually this has happened on my other external hard drive too, and i've never been able to solve this problem

most of the time i can eject without a problem and make sure nothing is going to and from the external, but after copying files for a long time in one session, i get the "can't stop generic volume device because a program is still using it" message

i did research and found ways to uninstall the driver as a permanent fix to turning off the computer to unplug to using Process Explorer..granted it was the final straw last night but yeah..

Is there a permanent fix or a good, clean way to solve this problem? And an explanation to why it does this? Thanks.

Hello disasterpiece91

In device manager/drive/policies tab is it set to quick removal of better performance. I was having a similar problem and set it to quick removal and that sorted it.I still use the safely remove hardware to be on the safe side though.


Danny

Does that control the level of write behind caching on the disk?

Yes I believe so but overall made no difference at all in transfer speeds between that drive. Not ideal though but this became very annoying so was better than waiting all the time, at least in my case

Danny

i do have it set to that, but i'm still wary of unplugging it just like that..

..unless nothing bad will happen lol

but can anyone verify the uninstall driver method?

Use Unlocker 1.9.1 to unlock any handles and free the USB HDD from the system to eject it easily.