You're transferring a file from your Windows computer to your USB flash drive or external hard drive. Should you 'Safely Remove' your USB drives? This is a feature in Windows that actually improves the performance of a drive by utilizing your system's RAM to collect the write commands, cache the files, and then write them to the drive later on. Write caching is NOT turned on by default for removable drives, at least in Windows 10, for the same reasons. At this point, it's a matter of "better safe than sorry", so if you aren't fond of hitting 'Safely Remove Hardware', then the least you can do is close all programs or windows that directly involve your external drive. -- Theoretically, yes. Windows has your back on this one by having write caching turned off by default for external drives. Since Windows 7 mostly adopted Vista drivers, adding up new devices on the system didn't present any problematic issue. Read more in our articles including "What happens when you DON'T 'Safely Remove' your USB drive?" and "Windows 7 Preview: Less of the Same".
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May 29, 2026You're transferring a file from your Windows computer to your USB flash drive or external hard drive. Should you 'Safely Remove' your USB drives?
This is a feature in Windows that actually improves the performance of a drive by utilizing your system's RAM to collect the write commands, cache the files, and then write them to the drive later on. Write caching is NOT turned on by default for removable drives, at least in Windows 10, for the same reasons. At this point, it's a matter of "better safe than sorry", so if you aren't fond of hitting 'Safely Remove Hardware', then the least you can do is close all programs or windows that directly involve your external drive.
Our coverage of windows 10 usb drive includes: "What happens when you DON'T 'Safely Remove' your USB drive?"; "Windows 7 Preview: Less of the Same"; "The 6 flavors of Windows 7". Each article provides unique insights and information.