Drivebar drive letters inadequate

[bawldiggle]

One of the features I like with xplorer2 is the drivebar for quick drive changes .

It is OK when only 2 (or even 3) drives....
BUT
with a new rig setup I have to write the drive labels on the wall ...

no label names.PNG

Is there any way I can read the labels without having to have WinExplorer open so I can associate drive labels with drive letters.
- and to flick "Small Icons" OFF turns the Drivebar into a row of house bricks, no ID in sight

row of bricks.png

A Popup, or label-under-icon would help.

I know I can assign icons to drives but I am not a fan of Win-8 nor Lego
- and I am not creative enough to produce "meaningful" images

I would appreciate comments and and any solutions ... thank you ....

[Kilmatead]

Drive labels are displayed in the status-bar when you mouse over the drive-bar. Why? No one really knows - apparently Nikos was allergic to tooltips at the time, or he never realised that some people never use the Tree, or that real computers tend to have a lot more drives attached than laptops do, or perhaps he just has the disturbing ability to look at two different places separated by thousands of pixels at the same time.

[FrizzleFry]

There should be tooltips for the drive icons on the drive bar.

[nikos]

actually there already are tooltips on the new version i started working on. But it looks like nobody's reading blog posts even if I do them TWICE?
www.zabkat.com/blog/custom-drive-icon.htm

[Kilmatead]

Actually, the OP did state "I know I can assign icons to drives but I am not a fan of Win-8 nor Lego", it's simply that he dismissed that as a meagre workaround - and fine... new version... what good is a picture of a glass of water to tired and worn men trudging a desert? If we at least had a glass of water we could fight over it, and spill it, and only the scorpions would be happy. See what you've made us do?

And come to think of it, why doesn't that folder-icon thingy for x2 automatically change those drive icons too? Who's in charge of that thing? He must be a seriously lazy git. Oh, wait...

[bawldiggle]

This would have to be the most laid-back forum I have ever encountered

All fun and very enjoyable.
- I must start a list of stupid questions just to stir the pot each day

And for newbies ...
- an excellent forum ... I always get an answer within hours ... and have some fun along the way.
- best $20 I ever spent

BACK TO TOPIC:
Thank you all for your replies.
@ Nikos
- when will the tooltips version be released
- wife has banned writing on the walls ... I have scars to prove it

[nikos]

v3 should be out early next year sometime. I just started working on it

[dunno]

Would it be possible to include in the right click context menu the "safely eject" menu so that one doesn't have to dive into the sys tray to safely eject the drive ?.

Erm, on second thoughts, perhaps a better name for that menu could be, Eject Drive, or, Eject, or Disconnect, or, Remove, or, Unplug.

[nikos]

usb sticks have an eject command when you right click on the drivebar, other removable media do not. I am not aware of any way to remove them other than the tray notification icon

[bawldiggle]

For what its worth ...
- four months later (sorry for my absence, my wife has colon cancer ... I have been very distracted)

In my opinion the Windows default "Safely Remove" (WSR) is next to useless.
- it is OK if you have one or two drives ... but just OK
- if you encounter a stubborn drive WSR is of no help, because it tells you nothing. There are no reports.
Then there is systeminternals "sync.exe" which is a command (no UI)
- it can only be run from Win CMD window or through "Run"
- but it requires 2 parameters which most newbies back away from, mostly because (IMO) users do not how to use syn.exe
- what complicates the issue is that syn.exe has to be manually located in C:\Window\system32 folder, and most users are terrified of stepping outside their comfort zone.
- sync.exe does not issue any reports, so the user with a stubborn drive is back to square one as with WSR.

Yanking the drive works most of the time BUT it only takes one screw-up and your data is gone.
- and worse

Free "Unlocker" is very unstable and crashes if things get to hard.

IMO ...the BEST Safely Remove process is to use two programs ...
- commercial USB Safely Remove in conjunction with WinExp context menu (free) Lock Hunter" both by CrystalRich

-------
EDIT
-------
Today I discovered there is now x2 v3
- it would please me to see drive labels in some form on the drive-bar -- my Xmas wish

[pj]

@Bawldy -- sorry for the trials your wife and you are experiencing I sincerely hope she recovers.

The slightly painful third option to the stubborn USB storage device is SHUTDOWN, when all else fails. Not sure if there's still a possibility of data loss if the write cache is still frozen / hosed, but at least you can pull the device without any power glitches.

____________________
PJ in FL

[dunno]

This would have to be the most laid-back forum I have ever encountered

If I could just summon the energy to bite nikos on the bits...that matter

[bawldiggle]

Hi PJ

In sticky situations, shutting down and then disconnect external drives has been my "fix" for several years.
- about 2 years ago I discovered some old USB sticks were a constant problem, so to be on the safe side they have been tossed out.
- I believe some older "sticks" had/have inadequate firmware on them (Source: sevenforums.com)
- at $8 for 8GB it is safer to discard old sticks after about 3 to 5 years
- my policy is 3 years and they are out, I destroy them with a very big hitter.
Mostly (90% of the time) it is the system that is the blockage and no amount of GUI or commands will budge it
- so far I have not lost any data, in a lot of years
Problem is most prevalent when My Toshiba laptop wakes up from "Sleep" mode
- Toshiba are notorious for added-crapware and that might be the gremlin, my multiple custom rigs are never a problem

I added my suggestions ...USB Safely Remove* and Lockhunter* for Nikos and any newbies to show there are other solutions

• But Nikos probably knows about these things and amuses himself watching us (of the chattering class) pat ourselves on the back
  Does he respond to grovelling, or do I have to lay it on a bit thicker ?

- what I like about both programs* is the sensible feedback (that Windows default safely-remove does not give)

@dunno
The humour on this forum is very refreshing
- some forums take themselves too seriously ... a little bit of light relief can change a difficult day for either the OP or a passing reader

[drac]

I have noticed that if I address an external USB drive by its drive letter (F:) it typically can be made safe for removal via the standard eject in Windows 7. But if I address that same drive by a share name (EXT) it will never be safe to remove unless I shut down the computer. I can sometimes use process explorer to kill any task associated with the drive, but that may not play nicely with the flushing logic in Windows.

[bawldiggle]

@ drac

if I address an external USB drive by its drive letter (F:)

- how do you "address" it, in command window?

But if I address that same drive by a share name (EXT)

what is "share name(EXT) \" and how does that work ?
Is that in a shared environment with multiple users ?