Hard drive seen as removeable?

[Nikolic]

I've just reformatted my PC and started installing my programs again when I noticed the little "Safely Remove Hardware" icon in the task bar.

I click on it, and it tells me that my hard drive can be stopped and removed?

Also, I've noticed, in when I go to my hard drives "properties" it has a tab for "Auto Play". Also, under the actual hardware properties there is a tab for "Policies" which has options like "optimize for quick removal" like a removeable USB stick would have.

I have a Maxtor 160GB SATA DiamondMAX 10 - 6B160M0

Basically, why is it showing up as a removeable hard drive, and how to I stop this?

Thanks in advance.

 

[tom_e]

its showing up as a removeable drive because SATA drives are hot swappable and as long as its not the system drive it can be stopped and removed just like a memory stick, im not sure how you stop it

 

[Nikolic]

It is the system drive though.

It never used to be displayed as removeable before I reformatted though? That what got me wondering why it suddenly thought it was removeable.

 

[brocksta]

i had the same thing, im sure it also had some extra stuff in the properties of the drive, which told me the read and write speed and things. I had to format again though and now it doesnt show anymore

 

[Steedie]

Mines always done this with every SATA drive I've owned. On XP Pro and XP64.

 

[Nikolic]

Mines always done this with every SATA drive I've owned. On XP Pro and XP64.

Anyway to stop it? Or to disable it coming up in the "Safety Remove Hardware" box?