RAID Set mounting SOMETIMES...

[afuera]

Hello friends, I have a system with a M.2 ssd boot drive running Ventura latest version, My sytem also have 2 Internal Raid sets (of 2 internal drives each) The Boot drive and one Raid Set always mount and work perfectly. Only one 6TB Raid Set of ( 2 3TB Segate Drives) Works sometimes... its a weird behavior, 1 of 6 times that I boot my system this Raid Set Mounts automatically and shows up in the desktop working perfectly. But many times it doesn't mount. I haven't figure out what does or doesn't cause this Drive mount.
Any Ideas???

I´m completely shure that this drives and system are working correctly. Could it be a Hardware/power issue or could it be a software/opencore issue?. I wonder why sometimes it does work with any issues... Any help pointing me in the right direction will be much appreciated.

I any case (whether it mounts or not on boot) I'm always able to see the drives and the Raid 6Tb set on the Disk Utility app. When they are not mounted on boot I can't mount them or force them to mount.

 

[Edhawk]

Questions:

1. How did you create the two RAID sets?
2. In the Bios or in macOS?
3. Which of the 6 x SATA ports are the two RAID sets connected to on your motherboard?
   • 6 x SATA ports highlighted
4. Do they both use the same Intel SATA Controller?
5. Does your mATX Motherboard allow for the configuration of 2 x Raid sets?
6. Do they both use the same or different RAID configuration, i.e. RAID 0 or 1?
7. If different which shows and which doesn't?

 

[afuera]

Questions:

1. How did you create the two RAID sets?
2. In the Bios or in macOS?
3. Which of the 6 x SATA ports are the two RAID sets connected to on your motherboard?
   • View attachment 574408 6 x SATA ports highlighted
4. Do they both use the same Intel SATA Controller?
5. Does your mATX Motherboard allow for the configuration of 2 x Raid sets?
6. Do they both use the same or different RAID configuration, i.e. RAID 0 or 1?
7. If different which shows and which doesn't?

Thanks @Edhawk for the interest, response and detailed questions, I will try to answer:

1, 6, 7. Both were created in macOS the same way RAID 0 with Disk Utility App.

3. The 1TB Set that is working on the 0 and 1 Sata ports. The 6TB set that has this problem on the 2 and 3.

4. Not sure how to look for this, from what I understand and cans see in the BIOS all are using the same controller and set to ACHI.

5. Could't find this limit FOR HARD DRIVES (just for ssd) on the Manual or web search.

Thank you very much. What bothers me and made me reach out for help in the forum is that is not only a matter of if works or not. Many many things can prevent/block 2 Raid Sets to Work. But WHY... WHY they do work sometimes??? haha it drives me crazy.

 

[Edhawk]

Assumption is that you have tried and checked the following:

1. Checked and reseated the SATA cables for the 2 x 3TB drives, both drive and motherboard connections.
2. Checked the SATA cables are not pinched or damaged where they have been routed through the case.
3. Checked both 3TB drives for any errors.
4. Yes, checking both 3TB drives may take a long time, but may be necessary to get to the cause of the issue. One flaky drive containing a few bad sectors can mess up the Raid configuration.

Do you have any spare SATA cables that haven't been used previously, might be worth swapping them to see if that helps with the intermittent connection issue on the 3TB drives.

Have you tried moving the 2 x 3TB drives to ports 4 & 5, they are currently on ports 1 & 3 according to the Bios screenshot (not 2 & 3 as marked in your motherboard photo).

Also just for clarity, your 1st Raid set is only 1TB (2 x 500GB drives) not 2TB.

 

[afuera]

Assumption is that you have tried and checked the following:

1. Checked and reseated the SATA cables for the 2 x 3TB drives, both drive and motherboard connections.
2. Checked the SATA cables are not pinched or damaged where they have been routed through the case.
3. Checked both 3TB drives for any errors.
4. Yes, checking both 3TB drives may take a long time, but may be necessary to get to the cause of the issue. One flaky drive containing a few bad sectors can mess up the Raid configuration.

Do you have any spare SATA cables that haven't been used previously, might be worth swapping them to see if that helps with the intermittent connection issue on the 3TB drives.

Have you tried moving the 2 x 3TB drives to ports 4 & 5, they are currently on ports 1 & 3 according to the Bios screenshot (not 2 & 3 as marked in your motherboard photo).

Also just for clarity, your 1st Raid set is only 1TB (2 x 500GB drives) not 2TB.

Okey finally got a day of testing. And I have had no progress towards a fix but some results:

1. 2. 3. I checked all the cables and connections, then I switched the cables between the 2 raid sets and tested, then switched the Sata connectors from the motherboard and tested... and got this data:

- All the drives are working without erros and correctly
- No matter witch cable or motherboard connector I use, The 1TB raid set always mount.
- In this tests the 6TB Raid never mounted but was dettected in the Bios and on MacOs... but just not mounted.
- If I unplug the 1TB Raid, and run only with the 2x3TB hard drives the 6TB Raid Set Mounts. (At least the 2 times I tried that).

It would seem like a simple solution to think that MacOs Ventura doesn't allow 2 Raid Sets at the same time. But I think that is not the case and from some research I did I could find such limitation.

I know that the 2 Sets can be mounted. Since I started this post (at least) The 2 Raid Sets have never mount together. I achieved this many times before, it has not happen again yet (But is achievable and it has happen that the 2 Raid Sets appear on my desktop and work normally).

I kind of think that is something related to the boot process or the time of boot... or something really small that if the drives time enough on boot they will mount.

Another thing that I don´t know or understand is that if you have an internal drive that does not mount on boot and shows up on the Disk Utility, like mine do, would you be able to mount it with the app?

Thank you again for your interest.

PD: And sorry yes the other RAID SET is just 1TB, I have the same setup in my office and with a 2TB Raid (but not the 6TB Raid set) and I got confused.

 

[Edhawk]

Did you try swapping the 2 x 3TB drives to SATA ports 4 & 5, what happened?

Do you have a lot of data on the 2 x 3TB drives?
Can you back the data up to another drive(s)?

If yes:

1. Can you format the two drives as APFS and see if they show and work as two separate drives, i.e. work with out any issues?
2. Can you then try Erasing the two drives and creating two separate 3TB RAID 0 sets, and see if they work OK, i.e. are mounted by macOS and fully accessible each time you boot the system.
3. Last test would be to Erase the two 3TB RAID 0 drives and create a 6TB RAID 0 set combining the two drives. Again testing to see if they behave correctly and are mounted and accessible each time your system boots.