Finally! New Windows Update Eliminates The Need To "Safely Eject".

For years, the fear of not "safely ejecting" your USB stick from your PC or laptop, thereby risking corruption, has been a powerful one. Anyone who has lost an important project (or an imminently due essay, or simply some cherished holiday photos) knows that it was a mistake you never made twice.

Now, though, Microsoft has confirmed that as of Window 10 Version 1809, this is no longer something you need worry about. In fact, as long as you are not in the process of actively writing files onto the flash drive as it disconnects, a new feature is on hand to ensure your files are safe.

Named Quick Removal, this handy little feature is now the default setting for each new USB device you plug in to your system, as opposed to the previous default, Better Performance. That setting kept the drive in a state of permanent readiness, allowing Windows to cache writing operations to the external drive.

Now, Quick Removal allows you to actively remove the device with complete safety, at any time during which you aren't writing files.

The one downside is that, as you may have guessed, performance may be affected under this new setting, so for those transferring large files it may still be better to revert to the old setting, which is easily done via the following steps:

1.  Connect the device to the computer.
2. Right-click Start, and then select File Explorer.
3. In File Explorer, identify the letter or label that is associated with the device (for example, USB Drive (D:)).
4. Right-click Start, and then select Disk Management.
5. In the lower section of the Disk Management window, right-click the label of the device, and then click Properties.
6. Select Policies, and then select the policy you want to use.

It should be noted that you should make sure you have the updated 1809 version of Windows 10 before attempting this, just in case.

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