Unless your drives are mounted read-write (which only happens when you purposefully do so at a shell prompt, or are syncing in Emplode) there is no problem pulling the plug at any time. There is no "shut down" on the Empeg. Putting it into standby mode by holding the top front panel button doesn't do anything with regards to shutting it down, it just turns the display off.

So don't have fear when unplugging. The Empeg was made to handle it.