USB Disk Ejector – 1.2 Beta

[Update] USB Disk Ejector Beta 2 has now been released, click here for more information.

I’ve had very little time to work on USB Disk Ejector lately. I’m still continuing to work on it when I get chance, I am aware though, that its been a while since the last release. With that in mind I’m releasing a beta of the next version (1.2). Its not feature-complete and there are still unfinished bits but it should be usable until I am able to make a proper release.

Please remember that this is a beta version – not everything will work correctly. It will also only be posted here – not on the software page.

New in this version:

  • Options dialog added – options can now be set and saved. Click on ‘more’ then ‘options’ to show it.
  • Added options to:
    • Start the program minimized
    • Remember the last size of the program window
    • Remember the last position of the program window
    • Enable/disable balloon notifications
    • Close to the system tray
    • Minimize to the system tray
    • Enable/disable eject notifications
    • Use the standard windows eject notifications
    • Close the program after a successful ejection
    • Minimize the program after a successful ejection
    • Control the adding and management of hotkeys
  • Hotkey support. Not yet fully implemented.
  • Added popup menu to system tray icon.
  • Added an ‘about’ form.
  • Firewire devices can be ejected via the command line switches – I still need to add settings to enable/disable this in the GUI.
  • Added ‘NOSAVE’ command line switch – when used the program will not save settings to a file and will ignore any existing settings file.

Download the beta version.

Read the readme.

Please report bugs in the comments, some (such as the incomplete hotkey support) are known, but there are bound to be others.

16 thoughts on “USB Disk Ejector – 1.2 Beta”

  1. I have multidrive that seems to mount four empty drives at startup. after I mount a disk, when I ‘safely remove’ the one disk using your app, not only does it safely remove the drive, it stops all the devices completely- so re-inserting my sd card does nothing until I re-start the computer.
    i’m running 64 bit vista.

  2. Thats because your 4 drives are various media/sd card readers. At the moment the program only ejects disks – not sd cards within a reader. Those drives are identified to windows as usb disks so thats why they are shown and when one is ejected, because they are all the same piece of hardware, all are ejected.

    In short – the program doesnt support ejection of flash cards right now – only disks and drives.

  3. Fantastic work, I’ve been looking for something like this.

    May I suggest you change the behaviour of double click to open en Explorer window and right click to eject drive.

    Or better yet add an icon to open Explorer.

    Further still, could you make the program window pop up just above the Tray icon and then minimise again after action? This will make it look like a nice system enabled feature. πŸ™‚

    P.S. I copied the executable to my start-up folder and sent it to all my friend.

    Great work.

  4. great program!
    but regarding the problem with cardreaders (posted by shirinian), is there a workaround? (except disconnecting/reconnecting?)

    maybe reinitializing the USB port/controller? i know, that it can be done with the device manager (deactivate -> activate), but this is very uncomfortable…

  5. Soul man: the explorer window thing is a nice idea. Regarding the popup, it seems like you’re talking about disk insert/removal notifications?

    Hellion:
    Unfortunately I dont know of any workaround for cardreaders, I havent even seen any code/articles that give ideas about how to eject rather than remove the device. The easiest thing in future I think is for the program to just hide card readers to stop them being accidentally removed.

  6. Great new release πŸ™‚ it fixes _almost_ everything I thought lacking before, apart from these three ideas:

    1. Starting the program a second time should notice that it’s already running, and, if minimized, just reveal the main window (instead of letting two copies of the program run simultaneously).

    2. Clicking the tray icon a second time (eg. when it’s not minimized any more) should minimize it again (utorrent has this capability, I love it)

    3. When no USB-disk is connected, the icon should be sort of gray, but when one or more are connected, it should be some brighter color (eg. more purple/blue).

    If opening explorer windows is going to be implemented, it would perhaps be a bit confusing to users of the previous versions if this happens on double-click — especially since this program is called USB Disk Ejector, not USB Disk Opener πŸ˜‰
    Of course, a button would probably be nice..

  7. What a great app. I love it. Still needs a bit of tweaking. I agree with all three points that Yves Klein made in on post above mine.

    Lucking forward to the final 1.2 version.

  8. Great app BUT the older version always recognised the USB Disk, this beta version does not always see the drive “No disk found” with a disk insterted. XP Safe remove does see the device. Always the same device 8Gb Verbatim Store n Go. I guess 50% of the time No disk found.

  9. Keith – thats really weird, I cant see any reason why that’d happen – the detection code hasn’t been changed.

    Yves:
    1 – I agree
    2 – Again, I agree
    3 – Er, yes again I agree.

    I’ll add your suggestions to the todo list.

  10. Great improvements – I am often getting an error message about memory leaks and ‘xxx has a problem and needs to close’ – when ejecting pocket drives. I have a screen grab – mail me if you want it.

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