I just started with unraid and I was able to successfully create a brand new array.  I am loving it, and i decided to keep adding hard drives to the array, but I am having a bit of difficulty with preclearing/formatting good drives (or i think they are good)

 

Initial setup:

I have a minisforum pc with a sabrent ds-sc5b attached, 5x 12TB drives connected.  All is well

 

Discovery of the issue:

I installed a second sabrent ds-sc5b with 2x 8TB and 3x 4TB drives to the free usb hub on the first one and it gave my array a bunch of errors (which i had to run a parity rebuild twice!).  I realized that the 2nd sabrent ds-sc5b was causing the issue, so i connected the drive to another free usb port.  However I cannot preclear or format the drives.

 

Specific error messages (putting it here for other googlers sake):

I/O error, dev sdb, sector 8593248368 op 0x1:(WRITE) flags 0x4000 phys_seg 128 prio class 2

Buffer I/O error on dev sdb, logical block 317193, lost async page write

(from unassigned devices) Erasing: dd output: dd: error writing '/dev/sdb': No space left on device

 

Troubleshooting:

• I got a trial unraid for another PC and connected these drives and the issue remains
• I connected via usb these 8TB/4TB drives to my windows PC.  Decided to install truenas VM (passed through the hard drives) to wipe 3x of the drives clear (quick wipe with zeros) and 1x drive with cmd diskpart clean all command.  No errors generated.
• I used unassigned devices and clicked every button imaginable, couldn't fix it.  I used this across both unraid instances, and pre-/post- conducting the 2nd bullet.
• I am scared to take one of my 12TBs to this 2nd drive OR take one of my 8TBs to my original drive because i don't understand what is happening.
• I am about to order another usb non-sabrent hard drive enclosure to see if this is an issue with my sabrent bay, but it has been working for the last year with no (known) issues.
• nothing is coming up on the SMART that i am aware, but could be wrong.

 

server-diagnostics-20250113-1959.zip

USB not recommended for assigned disks for many reasons.