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

@guitarflex 

Thunderbay 3, meant any Thunderbay (or other device) with Thunderbolt 3.
I will test this today, I thought Sequoia fixed this.

Thanks. I feel like a quitter for even thinking let alone saying it but feel like I'm finally running out of steam to keep fighting the battle. Woke up in cold sweat in the middle of the night again and not kidding or exaggerating. Hope to continue to "do the right thing" and take care of my drives but have reached the point that it would be better to outright lose data than continue living this way. "In the end they traded their tired wings for the resignation that living brings" - Jackson Browne. 

That disks only eject in sleep with my Toshiba 16TB SATA disks and not the Seagate EXOS 4TB is what doesn't make sense and still makes me wonder what's going on. I'd be really really curious if a 4TB Toshiba in that same enclosure has the same problem...or not.

Temporarily have changed system settings until/if a solution is ever found. I don't like that the ThunderBay itself never gets any rest this way but seems better to do that than the alternative. Might still try to see if I can get Mac Sales to run any tests for me on Tuesday. If it could be proven that "we installed the same disk in the same enclosure to an M2 Ultra and it's stable," then I would happily accept that something had gone wrong with my enclosure and buy another ThunderBay to replace it. Obviously it does not *appear* to be a problem with my enclosure as much testing as I've already done. 

Obviously if I have to buy a new enclosure it would come with SoftRAID, so I need to somehow confirm my Flex 8 is fine before the next step. 

@guitarflex 

Let me ask around Monday or Tuesday if there are any other ideas for you.

Thanks. Any update on this? Still intend to call OWC but before I do, let me know if you have any other ideas. Happy to spend whatever money is necessary once I know where that money will actually solve the issue but am afraid of just ordering more disks, another enclosure, and just chasing my tail while eating a bunch of shipping costs. Still don't think it's the enclosure but if I'm wrong then I'd buy another....so I still can't make a decision on SoftRAID at all until I know whether I'll be buying another enclosure or not.

I just need to know how one in-house behaves with Apple silicon. The Genius Bar appointment was surprising since I fully expected a hardware issue with the Studio to be revealed, so when it did the same thing with their M1 Pro, I'm stuck not knowing if the problem would follow the brand of disk (Toshiba), the capacity (16 vs 4TB), the enclosure (mine or all TB3?), or just the Apple Silicon architecture.

To test it all myself I'd be ordering, returning, and eating shipping costs on a bunch of stuff, which I can't really afford to do and obviously OWC would rather not ship a ThunderBay only to receive it back on return. 

@guitarflex 

I believe if you wait until the fall, there may be a fix for this problem in MacOS.

In the meantime, unmount, unplug your drives is the only solution, before sleeping. (or set to never sleep)

@softraid-support thanks, just so I have the closure of making sure we're on the same page, does that mean we've entirely ruled out the enclosure? Specifically my personal ThunderBay? Made certain nothing has gone wrong with mine?

@guitarflex 

I am pretty sure, yes. the problem is one bug may cover up another and there is no way to be sure, until MacOS is fixed.

@softraid-support Thanks, I think that is most likely too. I know SoftRAID is an OWC company so my question is this: Is SoftRAID support here the same as calling OWC sales/support?

Waiting on macOS seems nebulous at best. I realize the odds are not good of anyone doing this for me but if I don't ask then odds go from slim to none: Can anyone at OWC check an in-house enclosure loaded with a Toshiba disk, connected up to an in-house Apple Silicon? Should I be asking you this on this forum, or should I be calling sales/support to ask??

I still need to get to the bottom of this to find out if I have grounds to call Apple every two weeks for the next year to pressure them, or chalk it up to Toshiba (and replace with Seagate or WD), and/or rule out my personal ThunderBay entirely.

@guitarflex 

Chat probably cannot assist, they have no hardware available.

You want us to take a Studio, connect Toshiba drives, create a R5 volume, unmount it and sleep it? see if it unmounts/ mounts during sleep?
I can do that.

Thanks. Yes, a Studio would be ideal (or even any Apple Silicon based on my Genius Bar appt). It's only with Toshiba 16TB disks on my end, so I'm not sure if it's Toshiba disks in general or only Toshiba 16TB. Whatever you have access to would help. It doesn't even need to be a RAID. I have several volumes on my Toshiba 16TB disks. Most are non-RAID. I only have one volume in RAID 1 on those disks. Most the volumes are non-RAID  (multiple single disk backups on and offsite). Whether the volume is in a RAID or not seemed to be irrelevant in my tests. Non-RAID volumes were ejecting the same as RAID volumes on those 16TB Toshibas. 

Posted by: @softraid-support

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Note: If only 4 disks in the Flex 8 show up, that is a Flex 8 hardware issue, I cannot think oif any bug/issue in MacOS that can cause only half of the drives to show up. The lik,ely thing is the enclosure "hung" on one of the PCI buses. if you see this again, look at the drives, are any lights frozen on? are the 4 drives all on either top or bottom? (the Flex8 has two PCI buses)

While waiting for the previous post to be approved, I was going to move onto certifying the two NVMe SSDs purchased Black Friday/Christmas. Connected the ThunderBay to the MacBook Pro and only 3 of the disks in the Flex 8 showed up. Did not look at the drives or lights because panic set in and am only reviewing your message above in retrospect. Did not touch a single thing or even the cable. Simply re-started the computer. All disks showed up and the RAID 1 volume rebuilt in about 10 seconds.

What causes an enclosure to hang on one of the PCI buses? Should I try anything else before assuming I need to buy a new Flex 8 enclosure? Since it happened first on the Studio and now on the i9 MBP, maybe everything I've been battling IS a Flex 8 hardware issue. 

Checking old posts and SoftRAID logs, I am reminded that in early December, one one of the Flex 8 disks hung while reading. I'm starting to wonder if an issue with the hardware may have been developing. Hope not. But could these two issues be related? 

Called OWC (now long ago) to inquire about how to dust/clean the unit while it was still under warranty. Sort of got a general answer from a PC user who spoke with me then, but I never actually cleaned the ThunderBay, specifically because I was concerned about damaging the fan if I tried. Of course that 3-year warranty ship has since sailed. The enclosure is now about 3 1/2 years old, and of course since then, dust from the room has collected. 

Took a few disks out to snap this picture. The board under the slots show some dust as-is. If I try spraying compressed air in there my concern is just blowing more dust inside of the unit, so I'm quitting for now.

Advice? Still not sure what to do or how to move forward. If the hardware has failed, can I pay for out of warranty factory service??? I'll call sales tomorrow and look into all options. 

@guitarflex 

I am trying to get a 16TB Toshiba for testing, that is the delay (In a remote office)

You can certainly clean the dust out, vacuuming or blowing it out is fine. No issues.

The Flex generally has a 5 year warranty if purchased with disks, check your invoice, I don't remember the warranty.

@softraid-support Thanks, I'm patient so not a concern on the time. I appreciate you trying as you're able. Helpful to get your green-light to clean the chassis up a bit. I'll track down the invoice which I definitely still have. From the website listing it looked to me like the disks themselves were warranted for 5-years but the enclosure only for 3 ( https://eshop.macsales.com/shop/thunderbay-flex-8/thunderbolt-3 -- fine print at bottom of page). Hopefully I misunderstood, and based on your reply, maybe that means that the 0TB DIY enclosure is only 3-years but when purchased loaded (which I did), it's warranted for 5. I'll check.

@guitarflex Do check, as I am not involved with hardware sales, so do not know the specific warranty policies on the 5 year warranty drives, unfortunately. But it is likely to be 5 on both, when you get the 5 year drives.