Stop, Then Swap

     More and more people are using jump drives (or flash drives) as well as portable hard drives that plug into a USB port to transport files without having to transport their computer, or to save presentations and documents for use on multiple computers.

     Today, with USB 2.0 on many computers, these devices can be "hot swapped."  In other words, they don't have to be "stopped" before they're disconnected from the computer.  But...you still might want to stop them.

     Whenever one of these devices are plugged in to a computer, a small icon appears in the lower right toolbar on the computer screen.   It's a little gray block with a green arrow on it.   If you click it, it will show peripheral devices connected to a computer.  Clicking the appropriate device will "stop" it so that it can safely be removed from the computer without risking data loss.  That's the reason to stop it before you swap it.

     Remember, however, that after stopping, you may not be able to plug the device in and have it work without rebooting the computer with the peripheral attached so that it can once again be started automatically by the computer.

     If you're using data that's simply a copy of what you already have stored on another computer, then hot swapping might be OK; but if what's on your jump or external drive is the only place it resides, you should probably stop it first.

© Michael V. Ziemski, Instrumediatech, 2008 (Original Publication Date: 20080616)

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