If you only need a shortcut to safely remove hardware, simply read this: How to safely remove hardware via shortcut in Windows 7. If you need something more advanced, snag this freebie.
You can get the free license here (2 days left)
and download the actual program here.
Manage drive letters
The storage manager allows you to quickly manage the drive letters of external devices. By the way, you may want to read this guide: How to assign static drive letter to external USB drive.
QuickLaunch for portable programs
You can also define a list of programs that you can launch from the external drive, which is very, very handy for everyone who’s using portable programs. By the way, did you know that Firefox and Thunderbird are available as portable programs? A good way to store bookmarks and emails on an external drive!
Check external drive for viruses
Be safe! You can automatically check your external drive for viruses. I’ve got to love this one. External drives are a major security risk. I already wrote about this a couple months ago. You may want to read this: Disable autorun for USB flash drives
Advanced safe removal
Did you know that every time you remove your hardware without probably ejecting it that you can lose all data that is still accessed? Yup, that is even more true when some special settings are activated for that drive.
Drive speed test
Although there are a couple nice tools dedicated solely to speed testing (you can find more infos on our guide how to speed up Windows 7 you can use Zentimo’s tool to do some basic drive speed tests.