Hi guys,

So i'm pretty basic when it comes to this. I set it up initially and things have been working well. I just happened to login to the tower today and noticed one of my drives had warnings and the contents showing as emulated storage. The drive shows up in unassigned devices plugin however upon stopping the array it will not let me select the disk in the drop downs... it did appear briefly after shutting the system down, taking the drive out and putting it back in but its doesn't sound healthy... upon reboot it was clicking away and it took an awfully long time to start the array up on reboot. Unsure if the drive is actually goosed as unable to run SMART test but assuming so. Is there anything I can try before replacing the drive?

The linked guides on rebuilding a drive on itself don't seem to be working anymore so struggling to find that. I have attached a diagnostics report if this helps anyone decipher my problems. Any help appreciated... currently looking for new drives but £££ have shot up. Is there any risk to me starting the tower with the affected disk out so I can see if it still sounds as horrible or will I risk loss of data although at this point i'm assuming its all emulated from parity at this point.

tower-diagnostics-20251212-1245.zip

EDIT: I have since tried to install the drive into my desktop but no signs of life at all, not even attempting to spin up and no signs of it in disk management. Have ordered a dock just to check to be sure.

Edited December 12, 2025Dec 12 by BranstonRichards

Start the array in normal mode without the drive assigned and post new diagnostics

Ok I can do this, at the moment I have the drive disconnected and the NAS is just powered down out of service. Do I risk anything booting up at this point with the drive out to repost a new diag or would you like the drive installed?

Your earlier diagnostics without the array started don't tell us anything about the emulated disk since it isn't emulated unless the array is started in normal (not Maintenance) mode.

Starting the array without the disk assigned and posting Diagnostics would allow us to check that the emulated disk is mountable. The contents of the emulated disk is what would be rebuilt from the parity calculation by reading all other disks.

If you also install the disk but don't assign, we could see if the disk will give a SMART report in the Diagnostics.

Ok so it looks like the drive was indeed dead and wouldn't spin up in a usb caddy, i've sourced a replacement drive (checked its stats in crystaldiskinfo to be good), Installed, assigned where the disk was missing and started the array in maintenance mode. Notifications says disk 3 is being reconstructed and is available for normal operation. Justs wondering if I need to do any more? Like click the "sync" button below the "stop" button in the array main panel which states (sync will start data-rebuild) :).

Edited December 16, 2025Dec 16 by BranstonRichards

If you start in normal mode, the rebuild starts automatically; in maintenance mode, you need to click the SYNC button.

Thank you, I couldn't find any progress regarding the rebuild. Just hit that sync button and I have a progress bar now :). fingers crossed.

EDIT: 0.1% per minute progress for those interested :')

Edited December 16, 2025Dec 16 by BranstonRichards

Sounds like we don't really know if you are rebuilding a mountable disk since you didn't follow my instructions.

When the rebuild is complete, if the disk shows up as unmountable, you will have to check filesystem.

Be sure you DO NOT FORMAT.