[PatK]

Perhaps this thread could be synthesized into one suggestion for the Features Suggestion forum. I personally have all my drives external and internal manually assigned letter starting from 'Z' back up the alphabet, there's no letting windows auto assign a drive letter unless it's a thumb drive. I don't ever do a clean-up unless all drives are plugged in whihc more or less takes care of that. I'm not sure I want a requester up offering me to scan a thumb-drive I just plugged in. I do want to see my entire library, for searches and edits, but I don't want all my dozen or so drives spinning just to do a library search. I like it the way it is.. but then maybe I'm stuck in my ways, and need to be shown a better way.

[AbRASiON]

Maybe I've forgotten what I originally suggested but my intention was originally this:

USB movies and television which is NOT currently plugged in, simply doesn't appear in the library at the time
USB media is (somehow?) identified via manufacturer unique serial number, partition information? Volume label or heck even a damn file written by Kodi to the root /movies/ folder like ".KODIIdentifier0001.000" file (hidden, read only, simple datastring in there as a uniqie identifier?)
Movies and TV (as I ..think you would already be doing?) needs to be SPECIFICALLY in particular folders or it won't be scanned? (/movies/ and /tv/ ?)

Therefore a 'gumby' user could simply plug in a hard disk, Kodi would identify that "oh USB drive #2 is plugged in, with serial number XNTS11AAFDJK331" it then "enables" the hidden part of the Kodi library which is normally invisible when the drive is unplugged?

I'm sure, in some way, it's possible for Kodi to identify a USB device and load in a library, without requiring a re-scan each time. Making USB media a viable option
(Again, please note, I don't even NEED this feature! this is more for 'dumb friends and family' to make it user friendly for them)
Also note: this is a very very low priority suggestion which I think the devs should at least consider long term.

[PatK]

This is really a windows shortcoming in that windows auto assigns the drive letter, once you manually assign the drive letter for each external individually and separately. The library knows what movies are available and what is not. A work around for those who prefer to only see videos that are available, might set-up profiles for any number of drives, excluding those not online.

Here's a nice work around using media flags. http://forum.kodi.tv/showthread.php?tid=96183

Suggestions of any kind are best posted in the feature request forum if you want developer notice.

[AbRASiON]

My post was put here just initially to get feedback on the idea. I also wasn't sure if it was already developed.
Regardless my concept is about making it dead simple for end users.