Hello, Is speedfan the only program that does this ?

so far only speedfan and no problem running speedfan with the drive attached but i have to unplug it when i open the program. Trouble is i'm not real fond of disconnecting the drive with the computer running

In the bottem right of the taskbar there should be a icon thats says "safely remove hardware" right click that and click safely remove... then in the list of hardware click your external drive and click "stop" and your pc will tell you when it is "safe" to remove your drive. Thats how to remove while pc is on (the correct way) Now i am not to sure about the speedfan thing i have only used it a couple times. When you first installed speedfan was the drive plugged in then? If not you could try to reinstall the program with the drive plugged in. I am not promoting nothing but I use this to moniter my temps and voltages, CPUID
Oh and dont forget to safely remove that drive with the icon , every single time!