"SoftRAID Error" can't delete a volume SoftRAID XT

Time Machine is preventing the volume from unmounting.

See if you can force unmount it.

Or in Time Machine, delete it as a backup volume.

If you can unmount the volume in Finder, you can then delete it in SoftRAID.

(And you know you must create it as APFS in order for Time Machine to use it)

@softraid-support

Thanks for the quick reply. I actually did all of that a dozen times. It will unmount from the Finder or from Softraid but it still won't let me delete it. I am trying to delete it so I can format it as APFS so I can use it as a Time Machine volume.

Are those other volumes part of the same set of disks? then you need to unmount ALL the volumes before trying to delete one.

@softraid-support

Nope. One Thunderbay has four HDDs with two volumes: Media and Work. The other Thunderbay has four HDDs and one volume for Time Machine, now named Delete Me and not connected to Time Machine or anything else. The other volumes I have are non-RAID: my internal SSD, an external CCC clone of my internal for emergencies and another external called TV- DVR for my Plex/HDHomeRun DVR.

@stevek

Attach a support file from SoftRAID. Let me be sure I understand your setup.

@softraid-support

Thanks for your help. I know it's a strange issue that doesn't make much sense. Maybe I missed something that will be obvious to you.

Here's the support file as well as screenshots showing which volumes use which disks, although I'm guessing you can probably tell that from the support file.

It's getting late so don't sweat it tonight. Saturday is fine, or if you don't work weekends Monday is ok too.

Thanks again.

The Volume appears unmounted. And when you delete, you get the error?

here is another option. Physically remove the other disks, so only the 4 to this volume remain.

"uninstall SoftRAID driver" and restart.

Run Disk Utility and erase each disk as HFS

Run SoftRAID and install the driver again.

(Allow OWC as a developer)

Now you can initialize the 4 drives and create a new volume.

@softraid-support

Apologies for the delay, I had a ton of work to do and couldn't get back to this until today. 

Yes, when I try to delete that's when I get the error. So I followed your instructions and that did the trick! Thank you so much!

One last question. I now have the new option to choose between a stripe unit size of 16kb or 64 kb. It says 16kb is recommended for compatibility's sake but I only will be using this RAID 5 volume on this top-specced late 2015 27" iMac (until the new Apple silicon version is released in 2022). I know the volume will already be slowed down since it's made up of four HDDs formatted in APFS which is required for Time Machine. Would I receive a substantial backup/restore speed benefit by going with 64kb? If not I'll stick with 16kb.

I'll stop bugging you after this, promise ;)

@stevek

Stick with 16K, that works fine for macOS.

@softraid-support

Perfect. New volume has been created and I'm backing up my Work volume only first just to be safe, then adding other volumes when that's done, one by one.

Thank you so much. This is why I recommend SoftRAID to everyone. Your product and support is second to none.

Thanks again and happy holidays to you and yours.