What's the safest way...force eject an external hard drive?

I have 10.6.8 on MacBook Pro. When I try to eject my 1TB external hard drive, I get the error message “one or more programs may be using it.” When I tried to eject it from Utilities, it said that “it could not be unmounted.” What’s the safest way to unmount it? Can I just shut down my laptop and then turn off the external hard drive after the computer is shut down?

Shutting down should always work, because all programs are terminated and they stop using the disk. But you often don't have to go that far.
Logging out should also always work, for the same reasons, although the only programs that get terminated are the ones in the user account that is logged out.
If you don't want to log out, quit any apps you are no longer using.
Mac Mail is notorious for hanging onto files that have been attached to emails. If you attached a file from an external disk, Mail might not have let it go. Quitting Mail solves this problem.
The Finder sometimes doesn't let go of files either, like after you do a QuickLook on a file. Normally you can't quit the Finder except using Activity Monitor, so I add the Quit command using a utility like TinkerTool because quitting the Finder definitely helps with some problems.
Another solution is to upgrade to Lion, because I hear that the message is more specific about telling you exactly which program it is that's still using the disk.

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thanks for your help, I want to do the right thing, and I have thought about moving the files back to the c drive by 'importing' and just start over. But is there an easier way. I was wondering about using the 'add folder to library' function. Since all the music is now on my ext. drive.
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3. Visit The XLab FAQs and read the FAQ on freeing up space on your hard drive.
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In addition to what Matt Clifton said, I'd add the following:
If you network your computers, you can format the external in FAT32, NTFS, or the Mac's HFS and both Windows-based PCs and Macs will be able to read and write to the external drive.
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What is the safest way to perform a clean install of OS 10.6 over 10.5?

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Processor Name:
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Use Carbon Copy Cloner AND Time Machine.
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http://www.macupdate.com/app/mac/7032/carbon-copy-cloner
http://www.bombich.com/software/updates/ccc-3.5.html
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OS X Lion Install to Different Drive
How to create an OS X Lion installation disc MacFixIt
Migration Assistant Update for Mac OS X Snow Leopard
http://www.apple.com/support/lion/installrecovery/
http://reviews.cnet.com/8301-13727_7-20080989-263/how-to-create-an-os-x-lion-ins tallation-disc
http://www.coolestguyplanettech.com/how-to-make-a-bootable-osx-10-8-mountain-lio n-disc-or-drive-from-the-downloaded-mountain-lion-app/
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http://macperformanceguide.com/Mac-HowToClone-backup.html
http://macperformanceguide.com/Mac-HowToClone.html
http://www.macupdate.com/app/mac/7032/carbon-copy-cloner
http://www.macperformanceguide.com/blog/2012/20120711_2-MacPro-internal-clone-ba ckup.html

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Instead, I've subscribed to the US calendar at this site:
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Thanks.

Hello, thank you for all these informations.
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I just purchased a new MacPro 3.2GHz Quad-Core Intel Xeon processor to replace my existing 2006 MacPro 2 x 2.66 GHz Dual-Core Intel Xeon because it cannot be undated with the new Lion operating system.
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I would even clone the original system it has.
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What's the safest way...force eject an external hard drive?

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