The warranty enclosure arrived yesterday evening. All set to go in my office and look forward to unboxing. But just before doing so, I loaded an original Seagate 4TB pre-certified disk back into the original enclosure. This disk was error-free for at least 3 years before taking it out and carefully storing it away in the tray. There were no volumes on the disk, it was left blank for when I would need it next.

Upon trying to create a new volume on said disk, I am now looking at a red-icon and 137 i/o errors. At first I didn't take stock of the reality. SoftRAID Disk column showed 4TB available and I knew there were no volumes on the disk, just the disk itself. When I went to create a new volume it only said 18.4 with no designation next to it, no GB or TB or MB. That should have been a red flag but I was tired so I just wrote in "4TB." Of course this triggered an error. In the .log file is shows "A program attempted to read or write past the end of the volume."

While attempting to create the volume, it got to "mounting" and stuck/froze. I was able to unmount all other volumes safely and the new "Test Volume" was not yet showing in Finder (just SoftRAID with a thermometer). Upon quitting SoftRAID and re-opening (every single time now), it then alerts me with this message:

Partition Map Needs Repair. 

"The partition map on the disk disk20, SATA (Thunderbolt) 4TB has been damaged. This may cause some of your SoftRAID Volumes to not work correctly. Do you want SoftRAID to repair it?"

I have clicked Repair but then if I close out of the SoftRAID application and re-open it again or just restart the computer, the message re-appears.

But here's the next part that leads me to believe we just pinpointed this enclosure as the be-all-end all. When I put in a second original Seagate 4TB EXOS disk into Bay 2 to check that out, it too only showed "18.4" in the disk column by "Available." It said "Size: 4TB. Available 18.4" 

This time I was on guard to not repeat the process, so I did not create a new volume, but did open the "Create Volume" option and sure enough it looked the same as the previous time...with a second 4TB Seagate EXOS disk in the same slot (Bay 2).

Not sure what that means but think I'd feel better re-certifying the disk that flashes the partition map error in case the disk actually was irreparably damaged during this process/hang/error. 

I will do that using the new enclosure that I will now unbox. But before re-certifying that disk I will wait for your reply.

I see in the manual that "hours of use" will remain if the disk is initialized a second time. What about disk certification? 

One folder should contain ~4000 files, since the issue began I can only see the first 400 files in the folder (in alphabetic order, not just random files).

When I look at the total storage capacity of the array it shows the space as being used, but examining the folder only shows the 400 files combined filesize.

Weirdly, if I go through Plex though I can still stream all my files as if they were still there.

I use SoftRaid and ran error checks on all my drives, it took forever but everything completed fine

I did a full rebuild of my array (took 21 days) but the problem still persists (the volume rebuild actually is hung on 15 seconds remaining for 3 days, but the log file says it actually finished 3 days ago).

Has anyone encountered anything similar? I'm just at a loss for how view the files so I can even pull them off the drive and start over again (likely with a mirrored setup)

1. One of the 7 HDDs in my ThunderBay Flex 8 encountered a read-error upon mounting the volume. Asked here and proceeded to validate the volume (successfully).

2. Frantically racing to manage terabytes and leave town to work remotely, I prepped for nearly a week: bought a 2TB portable SSD from Costco. Certified with 4-passes. Created the volume, then went back to the work computer and transferred a bunch. Sometime while sleeping after completing a large cloud upload (fiber speed!), SoftRaid alerted me in the morning to an error on the disk. A disk for the volume "2024 SSD" (disk25) encountered a read error (E00002CA). The disk (disk24, SoftRAID ID: 0A7D57921E017880) was unable to read sectors. The error occurred at volume offset 18926702592 (i/o block size 4096). This disk should be replaced.

3. Transferred 2TB off of the volume to a 16TB archive volume in a dual OWC Elite Pro Enclosure. Then with 16 hours to go before making the plane, began the certification process on the Costco drive AGAIN. Another 4 passes. Certified successfully. By late morning, initialized and created new volume. Mounted the archive volume in the Elite Pro enclosure. Transferred some data back and archived some Davinci Resolve projects. 

4. By now it was 2:05 pm, the plane was departing at 5 pm, I was on anywhere between 2-3 hours of sleep, and the Uber was arriving shortly. Used the OWC Disk Ejector to eject all volumes, as I had about 4 USB-C SSDs, multiple volumes from the ThunderBay Flex 8, and the Dual Elite Pro disks/volumes which had transferred the projects back to the portable drive after re-certifying. Upon using OWC Disk Ejector:

5. SoftRaid alerts multiple disk errors on the two disks in the Elite Pro enclosure (set to independent disks, not used for RAID). It actually says there are so many errors that it will stop reporting them to not overwhelm the logs. 

Dec 17 13:59:25 - SoftRAID Driver: The SoftRAID volume "Offsite Backup ThunderBay SSD Video Editing Dec 2023" (disk46) encountered an error (E00002E4). A program attempted to read or write to a volume which was no longer accepting i/o requests.
Dec 17 13:59:25 - SoftRAID Driver: The SoftRAID volume "Resolve Archives (2024 YouTube)" (disk44) encountered an error (E00002E4). A program attempted to read or write to a volume which was no longer accepting i/o requests.
Dec 17 13:59:25 - SoftRAID Driver: The SoftRAID volume "Master DRP Backups Year-End 2024" (disk49) encountered an error (E00002E4). A program attempted to read or write to a volume which was no longer accepting i/o requests.
Dec 17 13:59:25 - SoftRAID Driver: The SoftRAID volume "Resolve Archives 2024 Vol 2" (disk47) encountered an error (E00002E4). A program attempted to read or write to a volume which was no longer accepting i/o requests.
Dec 17 13:59:30 - SoftRAID Driver: A disk for the volume "Resolve Archives 2024 Vol 2" (disk47) encountered a read error (E00002D9). The disk (disk40, SoftRAID ID: 0A0D992591B35300) was unable to read sectors. The error occurred at volume offset 7662782115840 (i/o block size 57344). This disk should be replaced.
Dec 17 13:59:30 - SoftRAID Driver: A disk for the volume "Resolve Archives (2024 YouTube)" (disk44) encountered a read error (E00002D9). The disk (disk40, SoftRAID ID: 0A0D992591B35300) was unable to read sectors. The error occurred at volume offset 0 (i/o block size 512). This disk should be replaced.
Dec 17 13:59:30 - SoftRAID Driver: A disk for the volume "Offsite Backup ThunderBay SSD Video Editing Dec 2023" (disk46) has encountered 2 or more read/write errors in the past 24 hours. SoftRAID will stop reporting read/write errors from this disk for the next 24 hours to prevent system log files from filling up. This disk (disk40, SoftRAID ID: 0A0D992591B35300) should be replaced.
Dec 17 13:59:30 - SoftRAID Driver: A disk for the volume "Master DRP Backups Year-End 2024" (disk49) encountered a read error (E00002D9). The disk (disk48, SoftRAID ID: 0A7AB8A4326A9300) was unable to read sectors. The error occurred at volume offset 0 (i/o block size 512). This disk should be replaced.
Dec 17 13:59:30 - SoftRAID Driver: A disk for the volume "Master DRP Backups Year-End 2024" (disk49) has encountered 2 or more read/write errors in the past 24 hours. SoftRAID will stop reporting read/write errors from this disk for the next 24 hours to prevent system log files from filling up. This disk (disk48, SoftRAID ID: 0A7AB8A4326A9300) should be replaced.

I was almost going to carry the Elite Pro on my physical body as a carry-on to bring this home for 3-weeks, deal with it as need be, and continue to sort this out with support on this forum, but my Dad was the voice of reason, and so between the metal enclosure chassis, airport security, and realizing it would be far less of a concern to leave the disks at home in Nashville, I put the enclosure back on the shelf and made the Uber to the airport. 

While I take all disk errors seriously to the point of huge quantities of time drains, the sheer odds of errors on 4 disks within the past 7-14 days seems more than highly unlikely. 

I have a new Mac Studio waiting to power on in January after the holidays and this early 2021 Intel MBP has been getting slower and clunkier the past several weeks. I have no concerns about Malware. I check for that too. Every single error every single time was when either the volumes were mounting, volumes were ejecting using Dock Ejector, or the Costco USB-C SSD that was sometime while I was sleeping (and the upload was finished...presumably the computer went to sleep). 

Ambiguity and uncertainty does not feel good, particularly when I am unable to further investigate or follow-up on anything during the next three weeks away.

Any ideas on causes other than actual disks that could trigger errors? I thought about the OWC Thunderbolt 3 Pro Dock, but the Flex 8 goes straight to the computer, no dock between. The Samsung SSD drive that I re-certified was also connected directly. The Elite Pro Dual DID go into the dock. But I had to shut things down and meet the Uber driver. 

Several years ago....about three....I purchased a Silcon Power 256GB CFast 2.0 card for one of my BlackMagic Design cameras. Not all that long after, things began to get weird with the card when inserting it into my Thunderbolt 3 Pro Dock (OWC). Frequently, it wouldn't recognize the disk at all (let alone mount the volume), but if I re-inserted, it would finally load. 

This went on for some time until later that year it got worse and began to really concern me so I bought an Angelbird card instead (which just died last week and was replaced by a new SanDisk).

With other cards this has never been an issue, but in revisiting my CFast cards and running certification, I found the old Silicon Power card.

At the time I called OWC to confirm there were no compatibility issues with the reader in the Thunderbolt 3 Pro Dock. Just recently, I re-certified the card again and it passed once more again.

Sometimes if the Mac won't recognize the disk, then re-starting the computer fixes it and the disk is seen. 

I basically gave up on this card years ago and probably should have thrown it out but hate tossing anything in the trash that can be solved.

Any suggestions on last things to try before giving up on this card entirely 3 years later? The weird thing is that it's only in the Thunderbolt 3 Pro Dock. 

The cameras always recognize the card/volume immediately and all is well in-camera. Just have major issues with the dock reader loading the disk at all. In other words, it's not that the volume won't mount. It will. But the disk isn't even being recognized in SoftRaid, DiskUtility, or Finder. 

Will have to eat it and upgrade to SoftRaid 8 soon. This morning my new Mac Studio comes. But at 3 am in the morning, I was checking something and then this:

Upon connecting the ThunderBay Flex 8, SoftRaid issued a warning that according to the log says:Dec 05 02:57:32 - SoftRAID Application: The get info command for disk disk13, SN: ZC1DZY46, SATA bus 0, id 0, lun 0 (Thunderbolt) hung while reading (offset 209,735,680, i/o block size = 2,322,432). This disk should be replaced immediately.

Lately SoftRaid has been slow and felt clunky and I haven't changed the macOS or implemented any major changes. That's not why I bought a new computer but it didn't hurt. 

This error that it hung reading came onscreen, it mounted about half the volumes, and then appeared stuck. I didn't want to eject disks improperly so I tried the OWC Dock Ejector but it didn't eject what volumes had been mounted. I then tried restarting Finder but the computer just hung. I then used the command-option-escape shortcut and attempted to properly "Shut Down" the computer but halfway through the shut down the computer froze. After 10 minutes I pushed the power button off and carefully restarted everything. Bear in mind this is in the middle of the night or very early morning. Not ideal timing to be sorting these things out.

Everything appears 200% fine now. Re-started twice, connected the ThunderBay, volumes all appear, all volumes say "No Errors" and all disks pass the SMART test. 

I think the problem was that my computer was loading Davinci Resolve *as* the volumes were mounting so I think it was most likely just a temporary computer freakout. 

I'm still going to update my CCC overnight. 

As long as the logs show all is fine now is there really anything to be concerned about here? I can attach a log or report if need be. Gut feeling is this is probably fine but had to ask. 

And yes, I'll be putting SR8 on the new computer. 

Running certify again it now completed successfully (took about 140hrs). Softraid now told me that all disks are ready to be used.
So what now? trust SoftRAID on the failed message or on the Disks are good message? 
System is: Mac Mini 2018 64gb RAM 6 core i7, Thunderbay Flex 8

Fast forward a few weeks and it started doing it again except this time I got a disk that may fail in 2-6 months AND a log that indicated a caterr was detected. I unplugged both external TBs and worked without those drives and two monitors for the past few days. Zero issues. Plug them back in today, boot up, and over 30 mins, the Mac froze completely, twice.

Could this caterr error be coming from the potentially bad drive on my TBs? What should I do at this point?

I know there's an "Identify" menu option but it just makes a light blink....and there's no lights on these drives.

Without yanking the disks out one-by-one, rebooting and waiting to see if there's any warning popups, is there a way to determine which drives are reporting errors?

1. How to locate the damaged disc? Trying to locate the damaged disc o=in the OWC Thunderbay Flex 8 (has two rows of lights; this disc is the lower level bays). I use the command "blink disc light" and instead of one light, three lights blink. (I am selecting the disc at risk in the left hand column). Do I assume that the light that is NOT blinking is the disc that needs to be replaced?

2. The "validate the volume" (recommended in the video about replacing discs) does not commence the process of validation.

Any suggestions for predicted-to-fail disc and whether validation of volume is a must?

Thank you!

As I figure, there is no point to replace the disk now as the whole RAID will be useless being a RAID0, and I should instead just try to offload as many files as possible from this RAID0 before the disk fails. am I thinking this correctly?