Help Needed with Unraid Server - Disk Recognition Issue

[oscnhome]

Dear Unraid Forum Community,

 

     Greetings to all members! I hope this message finds you well. I am reaching out to seek assistance with an issue I'm facing with my Unraid server. First and foremost, I want to apologize if anything in this post is not in line with the forum's guidelines or rules as this is my very first time posting here.

 

Here are the specifications of my home server:

• Motherboard: HUANANZHI X99-8M-F
• CPU: Xeon E5-2660 v3

 

Disks:

• Parity: Seagate IronWolf 4.00 TB 5980 rpm
• Disk 1: Seagate Skyhawk 4.00 TB 5980 rpm
• Disk 2: Seagate BarraCuda 3.5 (SMR) 4.00 TB 5400 rpm
• Cache: Reletech P400 EVO 1TB
• Unassigned Devices: P3-1TB
• Flash: Sandisk Ultra Fit

 

     Initially, everything was running smoothly, and after going through the trial period of Unraid, I decided to purchase the basic license to continue using the operating system.

 

     However, on a certain day, Disk 2 started to exhibit problems. It first disappeared from the RAID array and ended up in the Unassigned Devices section with a "Mount" button to perform the mounting. I found this behavior strange, but I attempted to remount the HDD.

 

     Unfortunately, the remounting process failed, and even after restarting the Unraid server, my disk was still not recognized.

 

 

 

     Suspecting that the issue might be related to the power supply, I replaced the ATX power supply with a better 750W 80 Gold Plus-rated one. However, the problem persisted.

 

     Next, I thought it could be a faulty SATA cable. I changed the cable, but the disk still wouldn't function correctly.

 

     Finally, in an attempt to resolve the hardware issue, I purchased another HDD (the one listed above for Disk 2). It was recognized normally and worked well for about a month. But now, I find myself facing exactly the same problem with Disk 2 of the RAID array.

 

     The puzzling part is that when I access the BIOS, I can see the HDD properly plugged into the corresponding SATA port for Disk 2, and it is recognized there without any issues.

 

 

     At this point, I'm at a loss as to what could be causing this problem. Could it be a motherboard issue? Before investing more money in additional hardware, I decided to turn to this forum and make my first post here in the hopes of finding a solution to my predicament.

 

     If any of you have encountered a similar problem or have any suggestions to troubleshoot and resolve this issue, I would be immensely grateful for your help.

 

oscnhome-diagnostics-20230727-0926.zip

 

Thank you all in advance for your time and assistance.

 

Best regards,

 

Oswaldo Neto

 

Edited July 27, 2023 by oscnhome

[itimpi]

Just to clarify, I think you mean the disk is shown as disabled (has a red ‘x’ against it) rather than it is not seen by Unraid?    This distinction is important as a disk is disabled if a write to it fails for any reason as it is no longer in step with parity.    It does NOT mean that the drive had failed, as the commonest reason for a write failing is when the cabling to the drive (either power or SATA) is not perfect.    The SMART report for the drive shows there have been quite a few CRC errors which are ones where a problem was detected when transferring the data to the drive so it is quite likely this is the cause.   If you want to do a test of the drive you can try running an Extended SMART test on the drive.

 

To clear the disabled state one needs to rebuild the drive contents.  Rebuilding of drives is covered here in the online documentation accessible via the ‘Manual’ link at the bottom of the GUI or the DOCS link at the top of each forum page.   At the moment Unraid is ‘emulating’ disk2 using the combination of the other data drive(s) plus parity so you can see what would be rebuilt (although it looks as if the emulated drive is basically empty).   If you think the drive is OK then you can try rebuilding to itself as described in the link.

[oscnhome]

12 hours ago, itimpi said:

Just to clarify, I think you mean the disk is shown as disabled (has a red ‘x’ against it) rather than it is not seen by Unraid?    This distinction is important as a disk is disabled if a write to it fails for any reason as it is no longer in step with parity.    It does NOT mean that the drive had failed, as the commonest reason for a write failing is when the cabling to the drive (either power or SATA) is not perfect.    The SMART report for the drive shows there have been quite a few CRC errors which are ones where a problem was detected when transferring the data to the drive so it is quite likely this is the cause.   If you want to do a test of the drive you can try running an Extended SMART test on the drive.

 

To clear the disabled state one needs to rebuild the drive contents.  Rebuilding of drives is covered here in the online documentation accessible via the ‘Manual’ link at the bottom of the GUI or the DOCS link at the top of each forum page.   At the moment Unraid is ‘emulating’ disk2 using the combination of the other data drive(s) plus parity so you can see what would be rebuilt (although it looks as if the emulated drive is basically empty).   If you think the drive is OK then you can try rebuilding to itself as described in the link.

 

I just had to drop you a huge THANK YOU for coming to my rescue and helping me out with my Unraid server drama. Your insights were spot on, and I gotta say, I'm super grateful!

 

You made it crystal clear that the disk wasn't dead and buried, just "disabled" because of those pesky write failures. Darn those imperfect cables! And yep, the SMART report was showing some CRC errors, just as you said.

 

So, following your advice, I ran that Extended SMART test, and bam, confirmed the errors. But no worries, I got my hands dirty and checked and reconnected those cables like a champ, making sure they were snug and solid.

 

You're a real lifesaver! Your guidance made all the difference, and I couldn't be happier with the outcome. 

 

 Thanks again!

 

Cheers.