Too Far Afield

If you use Linux and you use CD or DVD media, you are probably familiar with this error message: Unable to unmount device. Device still in use.. It occurs, if you want to unmount or eject a CD or DVD and some application is still using it. This could be an open bash promt or a Nautilus window. Or a video player. But what can you do, if you checked every application that is currently running and you’re still unable to eject the CD? Terminal powers to the rescue! Open a new terminal window and type:

1. sudo lsof | grep cdrom

The output should be similar to this:

1. esd 12957 nachtarbeiter 25r REG 22,0 324153344 1418 /media/cdrom0/badewanne.avi

In this case you can see, that a program called esd (it is a sound deamon) still uses a file called badewanne.avi on the CD medium. You need to kill that program before you can eject your CD. All you need is the number shown after the programs name. It is the process id of the programm.

1. kill 12957

That’s all folks.

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This entry was posted on Monday, April 17th, 2006 at 14:45 UTC and is filed under General. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.