You can control the display of error dialogs through the API SetErrorMode(). Using Win32::API::Prototype it looks like this. See the link for possible values of the argument and note that they are bit flags that can be or'd together.

#! perl -slw
use strict;
use Win32::API::Prototype;

ApiLink( 'Kernel32', q[ UINT SetErrorMode( UINT uMode ) ] );

SetErrorMode( 0x8000 ); ## Updated per ikegami's correction below.

if( -e $ARGV[ 0 ] ) {
    print 'Found it?'
}
else {
    print 'Not found';
}
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Thanks that was a good hint,

I use Win32::API instead and the uMode 8 doesnt fix my problem. Until now I have to use :

if ($^O eq 'MSWin32') {

require Win32::API;
Win32::API->Import('Kernel32','SetErrorMode','I','I');
print "Disable :".SetErrorMode(0x0001)."\n";

}
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Seems that 8 is something else. With 1 I can surpress the "Drive not ready dialog"

He might have meant 0x8000. If 0x8000 works, I'd use that. Using 0x0001 could disable more than you intend to disable.

Reference: SetErrorMode

D:\>perl -e "print -e 'G:\some.file'"

D:\>
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I don't get the dialog on WinXP and perl v5.8.0. I just assumed different drives behaved differently.

Have you worked with the drives before and then eject the media ? On my machine it happens only in this case (on XP, never seen it under 2000). I use mostly perl 5.8.8, also it is from inside a wxPerl app (dont know if it makes any difference)