Is it necessary to disconnect secure USB devices?

Have you noticed that when you plug a USB drive into your computer, Windows will display a small icon in the system tray, informing you that you can safely remove the USB. If you click on the option to disconnect, you can safely remove the USB. But what does it mean to disconnect a USB drive safely? And do we need to do so with all USB devices?

Why disconnect safely?

Why do we have to remove the USB drive safely and what happens if we don't? To answer this question, we have to see how computers use files.

Suppose you have text documents on the USB drive, and open it on this USB computer. The computer will retrieve the document and download it into RAM so you can make changes. In the event of a power failure or a computer crash, all changes you make on the document while it is on RAM will be lost. That's why we always use the "Save" command while working so that the PC takes the data on the RAM and writes it to the long-term repository, in this case on the USB stick.

Is it necessary to disconnect secure USB devices? Picture 1

The process of saving to a physical media is not an instant process. The computer must write data from RAM to USB. What do you think will happen during document editing, USB removed from the computer? Since the recording process is not completed, the data on that file will be lost and the file may even be corrupted. Therefore, the safe disconnect feature avoids this by allowing the computer to complete the recording process before removing the USB.

Do all USB devices need to be removed safely?

We now know the safe disconnection feature designed to prevent data corruption by removing USB during recording. Therefore, this means that any device without direct write data on it doesn't need to be safely removed as a USB drive. If you want to disconnect peripherals like mice, keyboards, game controllers and Wi-Fi adapters, simply unplug whenever you want without fear of losing data.

You now know what secure disconnection to do, and why it is necessary and applies only to USB drives, not to other USB devices.

See more:

1. How to safely remove a USB even if the computer says it can't
2. Disconnect secure USB devices in a simple way
3. 5 ways to simply reconnect USB without "unplugging the plug