# SATA Drive shows up in Safely Remove Hardware? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [November 10, 2005, 9:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sata-drive-shows-up-in-safely-remove-hardware/330481 "2005-11-10T21:52:32Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 7\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![autobulb](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/85e7bf/32.png) [@autobulb](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/autobulb)\ **Post date:** [November 10, 2005, 9:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sata-drive-shows-up-in-safely-remove-hardware/330481/1 "2005-11-10T21:52:32Z")
My latest system is a little Shuttle box that I’m loving. I also decided to get a new 300GB Serial ATA drive since my older drives are out of warranty and could fail at any time. This is my first experience with SATA and it was easy enough to insall, I even managed to integrate the drivers into a customized XP install CD. The one thing that bugs me is in Windows (XPpro) the little icon for “Safely Remove Hardware” is always there since my hard drive is listed there. Is this typical of SATA drives? It’s just a bit of an annoyance and I want to take it off that list if possible. ---
**Author:** ![asterion](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/4da419/32.png) [@asterion](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/asterion)\ **Post date:** [November 10, 2005, 9:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sata-drive-shows-up-in-safely-remove-hardware/330481/2 "2005-11-10T21:57:25Z")
I believe that this has come up before and that it was said that such behavior is normal for SATA drives. I don’t know why. ---
**Author:** ![awldune](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/c77e96/32.png) [@awldune](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/awldune)\ **Post date:** [November 10, 2005, 10:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sata-drive-shows-up-in-safely-remove-hardware/330481/3 "2005-11-10T22:03:48Z")
In some implementations you can “hot swap” SATA drives. That is, you can add or remove them without shutting down Windows. I don’t think you can do this with just any setup, however. ---
**Author:** ![autobulb](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/85e7bf/32.png) [@autobulb](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/autobulb)\ **Post date:** [November 10, 2005, 10:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sata-drive-shows-up-in-safely-remove-hardware/330481/4 "2005-11-10T22:05:32Z")
Wow, that’s interesting. So if this drive wasn’t my main drive, I could Safely Remove it, and then just unplug it and plug in another one, very similarly to a USB one? I remember this was not a good thing to do with regular IDE drives. ---
**Author:** ![awldune](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/c77e96/32.png) [@awldune](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/awldune)\ **Post date:** [November 10, 2005, 10:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sata-drive-shows-up-in-safely-remove-hardware/330481/5 "2005-11-10T22:20:35Z")
> [@autobulb](#): > > Wow, that’s interesting. So if this drive wasn’t my main drive, I could Safely Remove it, and then just unplug it and plug in another one, very similarly to a USB one? It can be done. I think it depends on the controller on your motherboard, though. ---
**Author:** ![slaphead](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e9bcb4/32.png) [@slaphead](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/slaphead)\ **Post date:** [November 10, 2005, 11:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sata-drive-shows-up-in-safely-remove-hardware/330481/6 "2005-11-10T23:15:04Z")
> [@autobulb](#): > > Wow, that’s interesting. So if this drive wasn’t my main drive, I could Safely Remove it, and then just unplug it and plug in another one, very similarly to a USB one? I remember this was not a good thing to do with regular IDE drives. I’ve seen frontplates that expose a SATA connector in the same way as a USB port, so you can plug your hard drive right into the front of your PC. Hardcore geeky but presumably useful for some people. ---
**Author:** ![autobulb](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/85e7bf/32.png) [@autobulb](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/autobulb)\ **Post date:** [November 10, 2005, 11:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sata-drive-shows-up-in-safely-remove-hardware/330481/7 "2005-11-10T23:15:57Z")
Sounds like my kinda thing. Thanks for the info.