"Drive not properly ejected"--How do I keep a USB drive mounted constantly?

I have a 2-month-old iMac, and have had a USB external SATA-enclosure 2.5" 500gb drive attached the whole time. About a week ago, it started randomly giving the "Drive not properly ejected" message and usually it remounts after a few seconds. Sometimes it doesn't and I have to unplug it and plug it back in.
I thought the drive was at fault, so I switched it with a similar drive that was connected to my AirPort Extreme base station. The problem stayed with the Mac. Also I imagined that (somehow) the iMac wasn't supplying enough power, so I bought a powered USB hub. The result is the same.
I don't understand how it can work for two months and then suddenly get this problem. The only change along the line is that about a week ago I did a software update ("About this Mac" says it is 10.6.7). The latest update DOES coincide with the appearance of this problem.
How do I resolve this?
(Notes: There at least one other thread here where people seem to think that this is a Time Machine problem. I think this is because many people connect large external drives for the purpose of backup. I upgraded to iMac from Mac Mini. I installed Snow Leopard right after I bought the iMac and then tried to restore from my Time Machine backup. Something went wrong, so I mirrored my Mac Mini drive onto a 500gb SATA 2.5", put it in a FireWire enclosure and boot from that. I use the iMac's internal 1T drive for Time Machine. That may sound like "lazy man solution", but it could have a great advantage someday where I could plug that FireWire drive into my Mac Mini and not have any downtime should iMac need to be repaired. The random disconnecting of the USB drive doesn't coincide with any Time Machine events. TM is working fine.)

Kappy,
Thank you for your help with this problem!
Your hypothesis for the drive/enclosure being a problem is good thinking, however:
-The problem never existed for the first two months I had the iMac.
-I can switch similar drives with iMac and AirPort Extreme, and the problem stays with the iMac.
-It has nothing to do with Time Machine as I am using a FireWire drive to boot, and the iMac internal 1TB for Time Machine.
-A friend suggested a cable problem, but I have tried many combinations and it wouldn't explain why suddenly after 2 months three sets of USB cables can fail at the same time (at least one, I used for 3 years with Mac Mini.)
I now have a 111gb drive connected to my AirPort Extreme and it has been copying files to my FireWire drive slowly but surely for two hours now. The same drive disconnected after 13 minutes on the iMac. All indications are pointing to OSX 10.6.7. The perfect test (for anyone with convenient resources) would be to install Snow Leopard from disc on a clean Mac and not upgrade it, plug in a USB drive and see if it can last a day or two. Then, upgrade to 10.6.7 and see what happens. I hope someone can try this.
(Is this a ploy to try to sell more FireWire equipment? I hope not.)

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