New Mac Studio M2. SoftRaid 8.3. ThunderBay Flex8. All Volumes Disappeared Waking Up - Not A Good Start!

Another 60 - 90 minutes later: Tried disconnecting the OWC Thunderbolt 3 Pro Dock to rule that out. Now ThunderBay Flex 8 into Mac Studio, with Mac Studio connected directly to the Studio Display. Dock doesn't exist so far as the system is concerned now. Volumes still disconnected upon sleep/wake.

Then followed OWC directions to the letter to install Dock Ejector for Silicon Macs. Got Dock Ejector installed and functional. Sleep/wake still disconnected volumes.

Also, connected Intel MBP with SoftRaid 7.5 up to ThunderBay. Perfect. No volumes disconnected (also, whatever was preventing the Flex 8 from sleeping when the MBP was sleeping seems to have remedied itself, as everything was very normal with the 2021 MBP).

What I'm not sure of at the moment is if this is a bug in the OS or in the latest SoftRaid version, and since I can't load my license for SR7 to confirm and don't want to lose my 30-day SR8 trial by uninstalling SR, I'm not sure what the next step is....may disconnect the Studio Display completely and run to an old HP monitor just to rule that out too, but really don't want to keep subjecting volumes to this treatment, and since the Studio Display was connected to the MBP just last month, I'm skeptical. Everything was (comparatively) rosy until installing SR8 on the Studio and hooking up the Flex 8. There were other issues & other scares but none with the Flex8 volumes as long as the MBP running SR 7 was connected. 

Somewhere into the 3rd hour. Ruled out Studio Display by connecting old HP Monitor directly out of port on back of the ThunderBay Flex 8. Volumes were still removed upon sleep/wake. 

Looked over SoftRaid logs and began to notice that consistently, if all volumes were ejected and then the computer was put to sleep and awoken, 4 volumes spanning two disks would consistently mount upon wakefulness. No error of course because everything had been dismounted prior to sleep. 

Digging deeper, I found that these were two large capacity archival disks. 16TB disks in bays 5-6 (bottom row leftmost, then next drive bay immediately to its right). 

I then removed those disks, which were in RAID 1. Powered everything back up and no errors, it was all smooth sailing. I then connected back up to the Studio Display to confirm (still bypassing the TB 3 Pro Dock).

Finally, with both bays now empty, I looked for another mirrored RAID 1 set of disks and moved them into the same bays that the 16TB set had been in. I hoped this would help to determine if the issue was tied to the disks or the bays.

With two 4TB Seagate disks in the same bays as the 16TB Toshibas had been in (all rigorously certified, all confirmed good health), there are no disconnected volumes. Furthermore, if I eject the volumes, then put the Studio to sleep, then re-awaken, the volume does not magically mount upon waking (the way that the volumes contained on the 16TB pair did). Again, this is with two 4TB disks in RAID 1 occupying the same bays the two 16TB disks had been in before.

Still not sure if that points towards a SoftRaid bug or a macOS issue, but is as far as I could take things by myself to provide the information for support. 

Once more, Intel MBP running Monterey 12.7.2 with SoftRaid 7.5 is non-eventful. None of this happens with that system. Just the new Mac Studio running Sequoia 15.2 with SoftRaid 8.3. So I'm as assured as I can be that this is not a disk issue, nor ThunderBay Flex 8 issue. 

Thanks for hanging in there through these long posts. Hope it is all helpful and useful information to help. 

Now what do I do? 

@guitarflex 

Couple initial comments:

the SoftRAID driver loads automatically and is determined by the MacOS version. there is no way to "uninstall" the driver, only the application and supporting components.

Disk ejects is controlled totally by MacOS, SoftRAID is a bystander to sleep related issues.

SoftRAID always warns of disks ejecting, MacOS does not.

Lastly, the fact your volumes mounted after waking from sleep, means they ejected during sleep, so MacOS mounted the volumes when waking up.

So this means the issue has to be hardware related and you nicely identified an issue with the 16TB drives. I do not understand, but its pretty obvious.

I can try doing some tests and see if I can see that here.

@softraid-support Thanks....just back from the store and double-confirmed this by putting the pair of 16TB disks into bays 4 and 8 (different bays than before). Did not want to have another error so tested a different way: ejected all disks using Dock Ejector, then put Mac Studio to sleep. Upon waking, sure enough, all volumes on the 16TB pair mounted. 

Very informative and helpful, thank you again.

Re: Hardware-related. Wouldn't the fact that it happens with the Mac Studio but not the MacBook Pro essentially rule out the enclosure?

To further go down the rabbit hole, just hooked up an Elite Pro Dual enclosure with two 16TB disks. While the Dock Ejector does not work when connected up directly to the Studio (think this is because it requires OWC docks to work), the volumes appear stable, both when connected directly to the Mac Studio, and then again when connected to the ThunderBay Flex 8. (BTW, when connected to the ThunderBay, then Dock Ejector works for those disks/volumes in the Elite Pro enclosure, so I think I just answered that part of my own question). 

I don't have it left in me to pull the pair of 16TB disks out of the Elite Pro tonight, mount them in a tray and see if things get weird when the ones that are currently stable are then put into the ThunderBay, but maybe tomorrow.

By hardware-issue, am I correct that you're referring to the disks as the hardware? The fact that it's not an issue with a different computer leads me to think the hardware would not be the Flex8, and the fact that now two 16TB disks seems to be fine in an Elite Pro enclosure connected up to the Mac Studio leads me to rule out the Mac Studio itself.

Please run any tests that you can. I need to get to the bottom of this wherever it leads. Thank you for your help!

Posted by: @softraid-support

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Lastly, the fact your volumes mounted after waking from sleep, means they ejected during sleep, so MacOS mounted the volumes when waking up.

I'm re-reading this after midnight with a high gravity beer (ha!) as I review what just happened and think about what to move on with tomorrow. This quote above made me want to clarify that the volumes mounted upon waking when I had deliberately unmounted those volumes prior to putting the computer to sleep. I did that on purpose in order to try to avoid more "disk not ejected properly/volume disappeared" error notifications. So because I manually ejected the volume first makes me wonder what "they ejected during sleep" refers to, since I'm trying to understand all of this better so that I can take better care of data. I've been trying very hard to for at least 4 years now. When things go smoothly, I don't think about it. When hiccups come up, a lot of times I still feel like a beginner.

At this point my main hope is that the Flex8 enclosure and Mac Studio are all good. If it's those two specific 16TB disks themselves not playing nice with 15.2, I'd prefer that to any real issues with the ThunderBay or computer itself.

Pretty sure I'll take a couple 16TB disks out of that Elite Pro tomorrow and mount on trays to try in the ThunderBay. See if those are all good. Also have another pair of 16TB disks in trays stored off-site that I may try to retrieve for further testing. Also, I'm going to look at models and make notes if there are any differences. As far as I can recall, all my 16TB disks are Toshiba Enterprise Class HDs. Got them all at various points from OWC and certified everything meticulously. Not sure if all the 16TB Toshibas the same model number or not. Will look tomorrow. 

@guitarflex 

Sorry for lack of clarity, by "hardware", I simply mean any hardware, including the Studio. Something is going on, that is unusual.

When drives are connected to a Mac, their volumes auto mount. that is basic. Think about if you unmount first, then sleep and they mount when you wake up the computer. this means that the disks "ejected" at some point during sleep, then when they connected again, they mounted. I am just clarifying how this stuff works, so you can then deduce what must be happening.

I did a little testing (not comprehensive) today, and did not see this, so need to work on it some more. What brand drives are these 16TB?
Since you have apparently another pair of these, what if you do the same test with different 16TB drives? Are they the same brand/model also?

This does not seem to be the cable causing this, nor the enclosure. One conjecture could be when the Mac goes to sleep, the mac (when it wakes up during sleep) is losing touch with these drives. One odd behavior on macOS, is during sleep, the drives will wake up every 45 minutes or so (A hibernate design issue/bug) If you listen when the machine is sleeping, you may hear them spin up. Its likely during this wake up cycle that this is happening.

One other idea, is if you put these two drives in bay 1-2, which have more internal PCI lanes, what happens? Just curious.

Posted by: @softraid-support

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@guitarflex 

Think about if you unmount first, then sleep and they mount when you wake up the computer. this means that the disks "ejected" at some point during sleep, then when they connected again, they mounted. I am just clarifying how this stuff works, so you can then deduce what must be happening.

That makes sense now. It's very clear when explained that way. Thanks for the clarification. 

Posted by: @softraid-support

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What brand drives are these 16TB?
Since you have apparently another pair of these, what if you do the same test with different 16TB drives? Are they the same brand/model also?

Brand is Toshiba (Enterprise class). I'm pretty sure the pair in the Elite Pro is also Toshiba but won't know until I pull the disks tomorrow. Also, I have another pair of 16TB but they are stored offsite. I'll try to retrieve them to check but am fairly certain those too are Toshiba. Not sure about the model numbers but can compare those when I pull the disks in the Elite Pro. Hopefully I can get the offsite pair too but that depends on when the person they're stored with is around to physically pick them up for an hour or two.

Posted by: @softraid-support

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One other idea, is if you put these two drives in bay 1-2, which have more internal PCI lanes, what happens?

I'll do that in the light of day and report back. Right now the Shuttle One is in bay 1 but I need to pull it anyhow to do some installations into a new Shuttle and certify a pair of SSDs I picked up over Black Friday. Of course, I'll also pull the disks from the other enclosure and compare model numbers. It's pushing 2 am here right now and seems wiser to wait on pulling disks until after some rest. 

Many thanks for the replies and help. It's important to me to get this sorted out, and while I can't (more accurately would prefer not to) imagine anything catastrophic causing this with the Studio itself, my return window with BH ends on the 30th so it seems wise to get to the bottom of whatever's causing this well before then. 

Will be updating this thread in subsequent posts throughout the afternoon as I'm able (juggling several things). Hope to get the offsite drives later to put those into the mix/test as well. 1st answers:

When I put the two Toshiba 16TB disks into bays 1-2, it does the same thing again. Once more, I didn't want to willfully abuse the volumes, so I tested by ejecting all volumes first, then putting the Studio to sleep, then awakening it. Both 16TB disks with volumes (one 4TB volume in RAID 1, other volumes occupying the rest of the allocated space) mounted upon waking up. So Bays 1-2 with more internal PCI lanes didn't change anything.

The model is identical to each: Toshiba MG08ACA16TE. Part No. HDEPX10GHA51

Firmware confuses me since on the disks themselves (both ordered new from OWC not more than a couple years ago), there's a line crossing out the manufacturing firmware code but it looks like it reads either 1002 or 4002 (can't tell because the black sharpie is down the middle). In SoftRaid itself, the model number corresponds to that shown on the disk labels. But the Firmware shown in SoftRaid reads "0103" -- is the SoftRaid number the definitive answer for what the firmware on the disks is?

Next step, getting a different pair of 16TB Toshibas out of the Elite Pro and mounting on trays to go into the ThunderBay. Will report back with what that reveals and models, firmware, etc. 

Next update. Offsite disks have not yet been retrieved BUT....

Two 16TB Toshibas were removed from an Elite Pro Dual enclosure. To recap, these disks were operating without any issue when connected up to the Mac Studio.

Loaded both into a couple spare Flex8 trays and installed into ThunderBay Flex 8. They too mount upon waking, so had I not ejected first, surely they too would have disconnected improperly during sleep. This is with the pair that was in the Elite Pro now in Bays 1-2 of the Flex8. 

The model and part numbers are identical to all four 16TB Toshiba disks. Models are unanimously MG08ACA16TE. Part No. HDEPX10GHA51 Rev. No. A1 -- that is identical across the four in-house (would still like to check the pair off-site). 

The firmware is not the same though. The pair that was always in the Flex8 is Firmware 0103 (recalling that the label had a sharpie drawn through the Firmware code...again, that disk was purchased brand-new from OWC so the sharpie remains a mystery). The pair that was in the Elite Pro and has now been transferred into the Flex8 shows the firmware number that matches the label on the disk itself: Firmware 4002

Now when putting the Mac Studio to sleep (after properly ejecting volumes), the ThunderBay first goes to sleep but then moments later I hear the disks spin-up and the blue light on the front of the ThunderBay comes on. When I go back into SoftRaid I see that all 16TB disks/volumes have been mounted.

After doing this, one more time I re-created the entire scenario using the MacBook Pro. Then I connected the MacBook Pro to the Studio Display. This simply does not happen on the MacBook Pro at all. Upon putting it to sleep, the disks in the ThunderBay seem to take quite a bit longer to get some rest too (but that hardly seems eventful: Davinici Resolve took 40 seconds to load on this machine and it takes 4 seconds to load on the Mac Studio in an early test I ran). 

Upon waking, what was unmounted remains unmounted. Again, Mojave 12.7.6 SoftRaid Pro 7.5

BH won't take returns on computers anyhow and if we have a hardware issue here with the Mac Studio it'll be between me and Apple but the reason I think the Studio is ruled out is because it's a non-event when identical disks are connected up to it in an Elite Pro Dual enclosure. If you want, I can double-confirm that by transferring the disks that began this mess into the Elite Pro to confirm, but what was always in the Elite Pro was fine there, but is now behaving weird when placed into the ThunderBay Flex 8. Which would all seem to point towards the Flex8 as the hardware-issue, if not for that the enclosure is perfectly fine connected up to a different computer. The Thunderbolt 3 Pro Dock seems to be ruled out too since I took that out of the equation early on. 

Just checked to see if there's any firmware for the Flex8 itself and only found that it's for OWC Innergize with Atlas media cards, none of which I use.

If the hardware issue is the Mac Studio itself, then why no issues with different OWC enclosures and docks? (just the Flex8 and only Toshiba 16TB disks in the Flex8).

I'd vastly prefer to not corrupt and destroy my disk volumes after spending 7 grand on a new computer! Not sure what to do at this point. The frustrating part is having spent the money to save time! 

So the latest is I just checked literally every port on the Mac Studio and tried both the 15W and 85W ports out the back of the ThunderBay just in case it was being caused by one or the other. Nothing changes anything, neither on the ThunderBay or on the Studio.

Then upon finally getting to the last port on the Mac Studio, manually ejecting all volumes, putting it to sleep and waiting a second to see, I heard the disks spin up, then went back to sleep. When I woke the computer up, I find literally every volume spanning all four of the 16TB disks I had placed into the enclosure have all been ejected improperly (along with the obvious SoftRaid notifications).

I've powered down the ThunderBay and simply don't want to keep subjecting my data to this kind of testing. 

All indications point towards hardware. I get it. macOS is software. I get that. But....

Would a clean install of macOS anyhow (perhaps rolling back to Sonoma) be out of line at this stage? I'll get on the phone with AppleCare if need be but clean installs don't scare me since I've done them before. That said, if I do that, I'll lose the 30-Day audition of SoftRaid 8. I believe support when they say SR has nothing to do with disk ejection but because the Studio is perfectly fine with the same disks in a different enclosure, and because the ThunderBay is fine connected to a different computer, I'm starting to doubt that the hardware issue is with the Studio itself. Because neither the ThunderBay with 4TB disks in it behaves odd with Studio, nor the same disks in a different enclosure connected to the Studio. 

I wanted dropping this much money to have been an exciting event and help streamline productivity. Now I just feel more vulnerable than before and like it's just one more set of problems to deal with. Starting to reach the emotional phase of this trip. 

Next phase: called AppleCare. Told them the whole story. Of course they don't want me to roll back to Sonoma but I asked anyhow. In lieu of going nuclear on a new $7000 machine that's only been used for 48 hours, they had me re-install Sequoia "in case there was a glitch during the update to 15.2" 

I was skeptical because we're talking about hardware issues but I told them I'm just trying to pinpoint if the hardware is the Toshiba disks, the Flex8 enclosure, or the Studio. 

Of course that skepticism was proven correct. No change. Guess I'll call AppleCare back now. Really don't want to update either of the MacBook Pros to Sequoia just to conduct further testing. I bought a new computer to make things easy and bypass mid-project upgrades. 24 hours into this now with no answers, only more head-scratching. Not the fresh start I was looking forward to. Bummer. 

Just got Offsite disks in hand. Just loaded first one in bay 3. Same model number, same part no, same rev., but firmware is different (0102).

Same thing again. Now when ejecting, that disk has not ejected with Dock Ejector. So I selected unmount from the right-click menu. Now I see "SoftRAID Error: An internal part of the SoftRAID application has stopped functioning properly. Please quit SoftRAID and re-launch it." Going to do that, then confirm the last off-site disk does the same thing, then return the disks to off-site in a few more minutes. 

(Edit/Add: Now the disk won't eject at all. It crashes SoftRAID. Trying to eject from Finder triggers "The disk Fretboard Offsite Backup" couldn't be ejected because the Finger is using it.: Stop the Finder action and then try to eject the disk again." 

Will update with report on last offsite disk in next post

@guitarflex 

I don't think you need to fuss over firmware, unless it was custom to some external NAS box or something. firmware on HDD's is pretty generic.

Did Apple tell you to try a second system install, rather than wiping out your system? Its simple and then you have a comparison to work with.

The trick is going back to Sonoma, I am not sure how to do that on a second system, if you do not have one already.

But:

In Disk Utility
Click on your startup internal
Click + volume
Name/save your volume
Shut down
Startup in recovery mode (hold the power button)
Select Options
Select "reinstall MacOS"
Point the installer to your new volume and install
Do NOT migrate data, etc. Use the same Admin name.
install SoftRAID. It will run. You can even activate on both systems.

Thanks. Offsite Disk 2 update, then replies to @support. First, the last offsite drive does the same thing. The model number is once more identical. Also, the snags with Finder not letting me eject followed me onto the second offsite disk once into the ThunderBay. Somehow it remedied itself or I remedied it and I don't know which. After a couple different times latching onto different volumes and not letting me eject, the only choice I had was to Shut Down. Around the 3rd time, I tried ejecting the volume that would not eject before using right-click "Unmount" within SoftRAID *PRIOR* to using Dock Ejector to eject all remaining volumes. Somehow, after that, it was never an issue again for the last 30 minutes I had to test things out. Offsite disks now going back offsite.

We have a total of six Toshiba 16TB disks all doing the same thing now. In the ThunderBay. 

Posted by: @softraid-support

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Did Apple tell you to try a second system install, rather than wiping out your system? Its simple and then you have a comparison to work with.

Not yet. But I very adamantly don't want to do that and am doing all within my power (which is fading) to not do that, specifically because my Pro Tools computer is STABLE (I don't even need a recording computer connected to the Internet), and is still running Big Sur. The second MBP/former video-computer that I migrated from is still on Mojave and needs to be in order to run Finale notation software that the company has ceased production on and forced us all onto Steinberg (Dorico). Meanwhile my 1500 pages of writings and life's work that began this whole video mess is built using Finale, which means I'm keeping 3 Macs in a preserved state that will still run the software. The developer (Make Music) assures that it will not run on Sequoia. For all those reasons I don't want to update the operating systems on my other Macs. I'd rather wipe out a 48 hour old system than shoot myself in the foot with a 5+ year project. Just like SoftRAID is adamant about offsite backups, I am adamant about redundancy with old software required to keep the entire 5+ year project from disintegrating.

Posted by: @softraid-support

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The trick is going back to Sonoma, I am not sure how to do that on a second system, if you do not have one already.

What does a second system have to do with rolling back? About to call AppleCare back. Asked them if I could just create a bootable installer for Sonoma and clean-install on the new Studio. They gave me the Apple "we want you to have the latest OS for stability" routine but wouldn't tell me that I can't.

Of course I get that you're suggesting to created a second volume and try to roll back on that instead to see if that fixes anything. When we were saying "hardware related," I was thinking that ruled out macOS, but are you now saying that theoretically the macOS could be the issue since it's tied to the hardware?