It’s very rare that one needs to unmount a drive, but there are times that it needs to be done. What you need to know before you begin is that this procedure differs from OS to OS so, for now we shall focus on the two more popular Operating Systems that is Windows OS and Mac OS. There are a few methods that you can use to unmount a drive on Windows. Let’s look at those methods and the steps to take:
How to Unmount a Drive in Windows OS
Using Disk Management
Disk Management is an awesome utility that is found on versions of Windows starting from XP on wards. Consider it a software that allows you to manage your drives. To access this, you need to:
- Click the start button and type “run” on the search area or you can simply click the windows button on your keyboard+R.
- Type in “msc” once the program loads and click OK. This will bring up computer management. Another method to get to computer management is by right clicking on the computer icon, select manage. Click yes on the dialog box that pops up about administrator privileges and that’s it.
- Once there look for disk management and click on it. It should be on the left pane. After a few seconds, you’ll find that all your drives are listed on the right-hand pane. Make sure you have the details of the drive you’d like to unmount.
- Now you’re going to right click on it and select change drive letters and paths.
- This will give you another smaller pop up window from which you’ll select remove, then Okay.
- A dialog box will pop up giving you a warning about what will happen when you unmount the drive. Assuming you’re absolutely sure of what you’re doing, you’ll click Yes. That’s it you’re done the drive is now unmounted.
Using Command Prompt
The other method is through the very reliable command prompt. Get to command prompt via the windows search feature. Once there in command prompt window, type in “mountvol Path/d”. Path in this scenario stands for the folder that the drive is mounted to. This method works great if you’re looking to unmount a drive that is mounted to a folder.
How to Unmount a Drive in Mac OS X
The procedure is a bit different on Mac OS and might I say easier. The OS made by apple is meant to be functional as well as user friendly. In the spirit of being user friendly, all you need to do is to right click the drive you’d like to unmount and choose “Eject” from the menu, that’s it. You could also move the drive to the trash icon. All this will do the trick.
Conclusion
These are the methods you could use to unmount a drive. There are other Operating Systems like Linux that also have different methods that we’ll cover some other time. Do you have any better methods or suggestions you’d like to offer? Feel free to share your opinion in the comments section below? We always like to hear from you.