Disk X has been surprise removed

Windows Event Viewer shows Event 157, disk

- <Event xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/win/2004/08/events/event">
- <System>
  <Provider Name="disk" /> 
  <EventID Qualifiers="32772">157</EventID> 
  <Version>0</Version> 
  <Level>3</Level> 
  <Task>0</Task> 
  <Opcode>0</Opcode> 
  <Keywords>0x80000000000000</Keywords> 
  <TimeCreated SystemTime="2024-02-15T14:22:27.6716575Z" /> 
  <EventRecordID>188801</EventRecordID> 
  <Correlation /> 
  <Execution ProcessID="4" ThreadID="476" /> 
  <Channel>System</Channel> 
  <Computer>PCNAME</Computer> 
  <Security /> 
  </System>
- <EventData>
  <Data>\Device\Harddisk5\DR5</Data> 
  <Data>5</Data> 
  <Binary>0000000002003000000000009D000480000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000</Binary> 
  </EventData>
  </Event>

if the drive does not exist

I did not have a disk X, it did not exist.

This causes the PC to stutter.

To see which disks have which ID, right click This PC -> manage (or start computer management) -> Disk Management

Go to Computer\HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\disk\Enum to see which devices there are

or in command prompt type

  Get-PhysicalDisk | Select -Prop DeviceId,FriendlyName,SerialNumber

or

  list disk

NB with

  list volume you get the health of the partitions

Check Device manager -> Disk Drives. Also view -> hidden devices. Delete the hidden devices.

I found a lot of Xvd devices. These are temporary hard disks added by GamePass for updating and playing games. You can safely get rid of them. Not so much the gamepass service.

To get rid of it permanently you have to get uninstall the xbox app, xbox games and game pass.

More options If the drive does exist

Other options if the disk does exist are to chkdsk the drive, update the storage controller driver and check if the physical connection to the drive is good Event ID 157 Disk Has Been Surprise Removed – Fix It Now

Disk 6 has been surprise removed (my PC has no Disk 6) and Flight Simulator 2020 crash