[pearlhouse]

I have 2 card readers in my PC. One is built into the HP printer and the other is a combo with the floppy drive. On a fresh boot both will read a card with no problem. I use windows explorer to view the contents of the card. Then when I click on the tray icon "Safely Remove Hardware" It will show me the drive letters to select which one I want to remove the card from. When I click the one im using while watching windows explorer window the drive will dissapear, and the tray icon will say it is now safe to remove. So after I remove the card the drive does not reappear. Actually Im not sure what is supposed to happen when I click on the tray icon. Is the drive supposed to dissapear temporarily? This happpens with both card readers. When I check in Device Mgr. I have a yellow exclamation next to the USB mass storage device. If I take the properties of the mass storage drive it gives me the following statement.
Windows cannot use this hardware device because it has been prepared for "safe removal", but it has not been removed from the computer. (Code 47)

To fix this problem, unplug this device from your computer and then plug it in again.

If I reboot the computer everything is back to normal until I repeat the above sequence.
I must admit that the card was pulled from the (card reader - floppy combo) with out using the safe to remove icon several times by my kids until I told them not to do it that way. The printer card reader I dont think it ever was pulled incorrectly.
Ive tried removing ALL the USB items from Device Mgr and then rebooting the computer so there would be a fresh install of all the USB items. Ive tried every combination of removing and reinstaling that I can think of and it still acts the same way. Ive tried different USB ports. My PC has 3 difference sets.
1. One is a add on PCI card with firewire and USB internal and external.
2. Is a "D" bracket that plugs into the motherboard. It has 2 external ports.
3. There are also 2 external ports from the motherboard.
Ive tried them all and still get the same results.
So now Im thinking its a Windows XP Pro SP2 problem.
Anybody know how I can fix this?

 

[Geekgirl]

Recommended resolution
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/310123

To fix this problem, unplug this device from the computer and then plug it in again.

The device has been prepared for ejection.

This error code occurs only if the user used the Safe Removal application to prepare the device for removal, or pressed a physical eject button. Restarting the computer brings the device online if the user does not want to eject from the dock.

Unplug the device, and then plug it in again. Alternately, restart the computer to make the device available.

This is happening because you use the Safely Remove Hardware command on a removable device.
You need to either remove or replace the device from its socket or docl or restart the computer

 

[8210GUY]

As said you are technically uninstalling the hardware, but why are you trying to do this ?
I'm assuming your talking about MMC cards, SD cards etc ?
If so you just take the card out when you are finished, just make sure that you NEVER insert\remove cards while in use, but when you have finished transferring data to them just take them out, unlike traditional drives they aren't spinning and only work when carrying out your instructions, when it's finished thats it it stops working and it's safe to remove the card.

 

[jamiemilne]

I've been experiencing similar issues recently with an internal card reader. This thread, among others, helped me to understand what's happening and this one is probably the best answer I've found, but I don't think it actually solves the real problem:

If I'm happy only pulling cards out when I know they're not being used and if internal card readers are not supposed to be " safe-removed" (because they're internal), why oh why do they appear on the "safe removal" list and is there anything I can do to stop this happening? Same goes for my main C drive: I know I'll never want to remove it with the power on, so why is it there?

I use a couple of large external USB drives and some pen drives and it can be quite confusing remembering which one you actually want to remove. This is not helped by having at least 3 items on this list that just don't need to be there, since I'll never want to use "safe removal" to remove them. So being able to permanently stop these items from being listed for "safe removal" would be really useful.

I'm certain I can't be the only person who thinks this, and I don't think I'm stupid (well not *that* stupid), but I've spent too long trying to find a useful answer to this on the web. If anyone can help or post a link to solve this irritating problem, I'll be very grateful.