I suddenly had this “memory clog” problem so many have been suffering from here and found the best solution for me would be to just uninstall Smartware. I never wanted to use the automatic backup, only the disk encryption, and was surprised to find that 1) this Smartware software apparently has been indexing files all the time anyway and 2) encryption works fine without Smartware.
After uninstalling Smartware (now using the pure SAS driver), I dont see any problem but one: the WD tray icon that would allow me to safely eject the drive before is also gone. While the standard Window eject USB drive tray icon does work, it does not really turn off the drive (white lamp still on, disk noise audible). It only stops once I unplug the USB cord. Is this safe or it will it hurt the drive?
I found the WD online documentation only recommends disconnecting these USB drives through the Smartware tray icon, which will “spin down the drive and turn it off by itself”:
However, at another place they say the drives can be used without Smartware. What gives? Will using the Window eject feature not spin down the drive and reduce its lifespan by “disrupting” it when pulling off the cord? Any official information on this?
If you are running a Windows OS use there built in feature here are a few links to explain how it’s done in each OS.
Here is the biggest problem I run into with all my External Harddrives not just my WD ones,every so often you will use the Windows USB uninstaller feature and what will happen is it will tell you something along the lines of that your Device is currently in use and can not be ejected,if you get that message and you are done transffering file’s it’s a load of **bleep** about it being in use,here is the best work around I have found for that problem just go to your Start Button in Windows and tell your PC to shut downand wait for the light to go out on your Harddrive then unplug it.
Also if you ever get the message saying it won’t eject don’t just unplug it anyway with the PC still running as I can promise you there is a good chance the Harddrive will be bricked and by that I man that’s all it will be good for,I know this because me and my friends were having that issuse alot for some reason alot for short while no what brand of device it was and if we just pulled it out about 65% of the time the Harddrive was Bricked,the olny reason I can figure out why my other method works is because when you turn your PC off it close’s all running program’s before shutting down and there for shutting down whatever program Windows is claiming to be using your Harddrive when it is clearly not in use,I have tried many times as well when this happens using the Task Manager to see what’s going on olny to find nothing.Also I just seen your’s was a Book Drive and in that case just follw the same stap’s as I described before then once you are sure your PC is off then turn off your Book drive.
