What makes a removable drive removable?

[Guest]

Archived from groups: microsoft.public.windowsxp.general (More info?)

Or, more precisely, what leads XP to decide what is removable and what
isn't? Example: System 1 is a P4 built in a Shuttle SFF case with the
provided MB; 1 SATA hard disk with three partitions, 1 DVD-ROM on PATA,
1 floppy on floppy channel, 1 multi-format flash reader on USB; the
system sees two of the flash slots as removable storage. System 2 is an
Athlon 64 built on an Epox Nvidia+ MB. 1 SATA hard disk (with two
partitions), 1 SATA DVD-ROM (using a bridge adapter), 4 hard disks on
PATA, 1 floppy on floppy channel, 1 multi-format flash reader on USB;
the system sees _both_ SATA drives as being removable along with two of
the flash slots. Either system properly sees an external hard disk on
USB or Firewire as being removable.

What leads the OS to think that SATA is removable on the second system
and not the first? Does the BIOS pass this information along or is it
something else? On the second system the C: drive is one of the SATA
partitions and the computer boots fine from it. It isn't as though I'm
going to start removing the SATA drives on either system while it they
are running (an impossibility on the Shuttle and merely very difficult
on the Epox) but this quirk made me curious.

John McGaw
http://johnmcgaw.com
[Knoxville, TN, USA]

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: microsoft.public.windowsxp.general (More info?)

John McGaw <nowhere@at.all> wrote:

> Or, more precisely, what leads XP to decide what is removable and what
> isn't?

First, there is a difference between removable devices and removable
media. Second, both characteristics can be determined within the device
driver. Consult the following links for detailled information:

Removable devices: "DEVICE_CAPABILITIES"
http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/default.asp?url=/library/en-us/kmarch/hh/kmarch/k112_53ec6d40-84a0-45f6-a78c-73fcc3c12e11.xml.asp

Removable media: "Specifying Device Characteristics"
http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/default.asp?url=/library/en-us/kmarch/hh/kmarch/DevObjts_3231b805-2b74-4578-adbd-978c04ee76fd.xml.asp

--
d-d

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: microsoft.public.windowsxp.general (More info?)

Detlev Dreyer wrote:
> John McGaw <nowhere@at.all> wrote:
>
>
>>Or, more precisely, what leads XP to decide what is removable and what
>>isn't?
>
>
> First, there is a difference between removable devices and removable
> media. Second, both characteristics can be determined within the device
> driver. Consult the following links for detailled information:
>
> Removable devices: "DEVICE_CAPABILITIES"
> http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/default.asp?url=/library/en-us/kmarch/hh/kmarch/k112_53ec6d40-84a0-45f6-a78c-73fcc3c12e11.xml.asp
>
> Removable media: "Specifying Device Characteristics"
> http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/default.asp?url=/library/en-us/kmarch/hh/kmarch/DevObjts_3231b805-2b74-4578-adbd-978c04ee76fd.xml.asp
>

Thanks. Yes, I know that there is a difference and should probably have
made the distinction myself. Basically I was mystified by clearly
non-removable (in either sense) SATA drives showing up in "Safely Remove
Hardware". I guess that, if I were sufficiently motivated, I could drag
the appropriate drivers into a hex editor and look for the applicable
data structure and diddle the important bits. But, lacking a symbol
table for the code, it would be far more work that it is worth. Now that
I have an idea what is going on I will stop obsessing on it.

John McGaw
http://johnmcgaw.com
[Knoxville, TN, USA]