Windows 10: "Safely Remove Hardware and Eject Media" is "Open Devices And Printer

I just purchased a Seagate external drive as a backup for my computer.

Without me doing anything the "Safely Remove Hardware and Eject Media" icon in the lower part of my computer screen now says "Open Devices and Printers" which is where it takes you when you click on it.

I hesitate to plug my external drive in if I can't safely remove it.

Does anyone know how to get the "Safely Remove Hardware" option back?

Thanks so much for any help you can give me.

:)

 

'Safely Remove Hardware and Eject Media' tray icon does not inform on successful ejection

I have a problem with this too, since upgrading to Windows 10 the Safely Remove Hardware and Eject Media icon is still on my taskbar but when I click on it the options given are to "open devices and printers" or "...", the latter doesn't do anything,
the former opens device manager. So how do I safely eject my SD card now?

 

Windows Anniversary Update an USB ejection

The "safely remove hardware and eject media" icon is still in the taskbar after the update. However, it no longer does what it is supposed to. Istead, you click on it and it takes you to the devices and printers window, which is kind of useless. Is there
a way of ejecting devices safely under the new update, without having to go to File Explorer/This PC?

 

Earlier, something in Windows change did you? -- YodaMan

Matters not, download, install tweaking.com's Windows Repair (All in One). Best to run it in Safe Mode with Networking. Accept defaults and check items #26 & 27. Restart maybe twice, to smooth out Windows 10 OPs. Also ensure icon rebuilding and/or system files association is checkmarked.

 

Does the printer have a USB or SD Card port on it? That can sometimes mess things up.

 

Thanks for bringing that up, Berton, I totally forgot some printers have such ports! I'll be listenin' in and learnin' *Smile

 

In Win 10 the Eject Button always has that at the Top (its a shortcut) , if you don't have anything removable plugged in ( and turned on if needed ) you will only see two or three dots under that , indicating nothing is plugged in.

Did you install any needed Seagate Software?

 

I haven't plugged the Seagate drive into the USB port yet because I didn't want to take chance of breaking it from the start. It's a 2 terabyte drive so it'll back things up for quite a while. I just want to make sure I'm getting of on the right foot with it. Thanks for your help with. I really do appreciate it!

 

The printer has an SD card which enables me to plug the SD card from my camera into it and load the pictures directly into my OneDrive. If that indeed proves to be the problem, how would I fix it?

 

Don't know about a 'fix' but there's 2 ways to safely eject a card or thumb drive, one is the obvious way with the icon in the Notification Area but another I frequently use is in File Explorer and right-click the drive to be removed and choose Eject, will get the same message if it can be removed/Windows is done with it. Does that work for you?

 

So far I don't think the Printer has messed anything up .... there's nothing in the "Safe to remove Option" cos nothing is plugged in.

If you haven't got the Seagate Plugged in you won't have an option to eject it..... only Removable Drives get that option , and the Printer's SD Reader may not be considered "Removeable" by Windows so you may not see it there either ?

I usually run the software before plugging in anything USB so Windows has the Drivers when it's plugged in and doesn't try to find it's own but Seagate may say different for your Drive ???

** Edit when I had a WD External it installed it's own eject button on the system tray. Does Seagate's software?