Does Monterey Have a Bug with Mounting External Drives & Images?

[AL2TEACH]

If Apple fixes this problem, I will be surprised because Apple wants all to get away from the older puters to the new. With that said, lol, I've been waiting to see what the new iMac will be like and I don't pay attention to the rumors of what it might be, I am waiting to see the real thing and yeah it's killing me

lol, I'm surprised in a good way

 

[Alvin777]

Hi. Great news! After suffering for four long months of no external backup (very risky) and .dmg not mounting (so I wasn't able to install things), the very latest update 12.2 has fixed this issue!

The report to their Feedback app had paid off!

 

[icharry]

2017 i5 iMac after updating to Monterey my external G-Speed raid seems to randomly disconnect and I get a finder message saying something like: "disk was ejected improperly"...but I never even tried to eject it.

 

[Alvin777]

Hi. I had a similar issue before. It's most likely the external G-Speed Raid's controller, it's electronics is most likely busted. How many years have you had that external drive?

Thank you.

 

[harriska2]

I've been fortunate with Monterey. I have a 2018 mini with a 4 TB SSD (Samsung) in an enclosure hooked to one of the USB C ports. I use it for all my data including images (reference links within Photos), install files, music files, etc. I left the user directory with Desktop folder, Photos database, and downloads folder on the internal SSD. This way if the SSD disconnects, it really has no effect.

I was running Monterey off a 500 GB Samsung on the USB C port until I converted the internal SSD drive to Monterey. And I use Carbon Copy Cloner to back everything up nightly onto a 10 TB USB A drive that is plugged into a powered hub. I mean really, my system has a crap ton of cables all over and never an issue. I do tend to stick with Western Digital for HDDs and Samsung for SSDs. The externals have been my first foray into USB C and I haven't had problems.

 

[Alvin777]

Hi. Sadly it's back, it won't mount stuff again. For some reason when this happens the Bluetooth also becomes broken. I'm not sure if this was connected but it was all working fine until I did a 'First Aid' on the 'Container' part of the main internal storage (a hardisk).

 

[ewu]

Nowadays I feel very afraid to upgrade Mac os, it brings new features meanwhile tons of bugs.
some of bugs could be get around. some of them are waiting for years to be fixed.


I could see that Monterey has huge problem with External SSD too.

 

[AL2TEACH]

Hi. Sadly it's back, it won't mount stuff again. For some reason when this happens the Bluetooth also becomes broken. I'm not sure if this was connected but it was all working fine until I did a 'First Aid' on the 'Container' part of the main internal storage (a hardisk).

God bless, Rev. 21:4

There is most surely a problem. When I saw this vid, I thought of your post, lol. Around the 7:46 mark I think but I saw it on Apple TV so I hope it's around the same time but I thought you'd get a kick from what happens, lol.

 

[Alvin777]

There is most surely a problem. When I saw this vid, I thought of your post, lol. Around the 7:46 mark I think but I saw it on Apple TV so I hope it's around the same time but I thought you'd get a kick from what happens, lol.

Thanks for a hours, I did it all: SMC reset, PRAM, Disk Utility (three times: Volume, Container & the drive), booted to recovery did Disk Utility there, booted in Safe Mode coz' perhaps it's third party software like anti-malware- it's the same, I then used Onyx maintenance app- still the same (I wish I could try Diskwarrior and CleanMyMac but my trials' had expired).

I then booted in Boot Camp Windows, updated everything and maintained Windows (anti-virus, SpyBot, Glary's Utilities). I checked if it'll mount my external drives- it did, no problems.

Big Sur & Monterey are the buggiest (and they're major bugs) macOS by far. I hope they fix it soon. I'll just have to deeply pray, fast, deeply hope + alms-give that the main drive would last, until I get to back it up again, externally.

I wonder though if a fresh install (reisntalling all third-party apps and manually dragging files, instead of using the Time Machine backup) would be a risk worth taking or should I wait for the next update?

 

[harriska2]

Thanks for a hours, I did it all: SMC reset, PRAM, Disk Utility (three times: Volume, Container & the drive), booted to recovery did Disk Utility there, booted in Safe Mode coz' perhaps it's third party software like anti-malware- it's the same, I then used Onyx maintenance app- still the same (I wish I could try Diskwarrior and CleanMyMac but my trials' had expired).

I then booted in Boot Camp Windows, updated everything and maintained Windows (anti-virus, SpyBot, Glary's Utilities). I checked if it'll mount my external drives- it did, no problems.

Big Sur & Monterey are the buggiest (and they're major bugs) macOS by far. I hope they fix it soon. I'll just have to deeply pray, fast, deeply hope + alms-give that the main drive would last, until I get to back it up again, externally.

I wonder though if a fresh install (reisntalling all third-party apps and manually dragging files, instead of using the Time Machine backup) would be a risk worth taking or should I wait for the next update?

It’s what I did. I did a clean install of Mojave and upgraded to Monterey. Then took carbon copy cloner of a clean Monterey install on an external bootable SSD with apps and files and copied it over the Monterey install on the internal SSD. I don’t know why it worked but it did. I’m wondering if doing out of normal things like bootcamp messes with Monterey.

 

[AL2TEACH]

Did you see that they (video) had the mounting problem also?

 

[JW5566]

An update on my earlier posts about two WD 2TB drives that stopped working after I upgraded my 2020 Intel MacBook Air to Monterey (random dismounts).

To recap, both drives were working fine before upgrading and both still worked fine on an older MacBook Pro on Catalina, potentially ruling out the drives, despite suggestions from people the drives might be starting to fail.

Initially a powered USB hub seemed to fix things (bought this as only previous drive issues on laptops have been lack of enough power from the ports) but soon started to unmount randomly even with this.

I took the painful decision to roll back to Big Sur. Painful as this required a factory reset of my Air back to Catalina and then upgrading to Big Sur. This took ages and I had to reinstall everything again.

The result? So far both drives working fine again, as they did before. Been connected for hours and have done some backups. I'm sad to say, it looks like either it's a problem with Monterey, or, the WD drives are "too old" to work with the new OS. I note that my Samsung T7 seemed fine on Monterey but I can't afford to change 2 x 2TB WD drives for 2 x T7s.

I won't be upgrading from Big Sur after this It's dented my faith in Apple to be honest. If and when I update from my Air, I'll be worrying about what external drives will work with it. Like most people here I rely on external drives for backing up files.

 

[harriska2]

I'm sad to say, it looks like either it's a problem with Monterey, or, the WD drives are "too old" to work with the new OS. I note that my Samsung T7 seemed fine on Monterey but I can't afford to change 2 x 2TB WD drives for 2 x T7s.

I have a 2018 WD 10TB external plugged into a powered USB A hub that works fine under Monterey as a CCC backup.

 

[cool11]

New version yesterday for monterey.
Usb problems still remain. It seems that apple is not going to deal and solve them.

 

[machinesworking]

So my personal experience with this is the last couple days. Out of town and two old enclosures Sabrant USB3 with 1 TB SSD drive in them to a MacBook Air M1. Back home connected to USB3 hubs that are attack to an OWC Thunderbolt dock, they work. They do not work connected straight to the TB3 ports on the M1 Air. To be clear, the LED light on the enclosure doesn't even go on. Installing the update, but cool11 doesn't give me much hope it's fixed in the update, since it would be a partial fix.

 

[hawkiboy]

I just upgraded to 12.3 on a macbook pro m1 (14" 2021). All of the HDs I have that came in a factory enclosure work (using a usb-c dongle) My 5 other bare drives are a different story. I can't verify if these external drives mount on older systems. A couple of them will mount but most will not mount on 12.3 with my M1. I noticed in diskUtility that some of them will show up, but if I try to mount them it hangs the Finder.

 

[cool11]

I just upgraded to 12.3 on a macbook pro m1 (14" 2021). All of the HDs I have that came in a factory enclosure work (using a usb-c dongle) My 5 other bare drives are a different story. I can't verify if these external drives mount on older systems. A couple of them will mount but most will not mount on 12.3 with my M1. I noticed in diskUtility that some of them will show up, but if I try to mount them it hangs the Finder.

So, it seems that you got a problem?

 

[HobeSoundDarryl]

Just received my new Mac Studio Ultra. Same external drive issues described in this thread- won't remain consistently mounted... seems to randomly eject and the notification warning about ejecting pops up like I pulled the cord. It will eject on sleep but will also eject if I don't let the Studio go to sleep, such as when consistently using it. It will also eject if I don't let the drive go to sleep, including one ejection WHILE transferring files from it (so definitely not asleep).

SAME drive using the SAME cable hooked back up to Intel Macs running earlier macOS remains connected in a stable state for days... as it did for months at a time before I opted to upgrade to this new Mac Studio.

I purchased this enclosure new in 2018 from OWC. It is a 2-disc RAID box and I purchased both HDDs inside at the same time. RAID-0 makes it 28TB and I have about half that holding mostly media to stream to AppleTVs around the house via home sharing: home movies, DVD/BR collection, etc. Since 2018, it has worked exactly as expected on my Intel iMac. Now I feel lucky if it will remain connected to this Studio for even 3 hours.

I think I've tried everything that a user can try:

• 2 new cables USB-A to USB-B
• testing both USB A jacks on the Studio
• tested 2 reliable hubs in-between to see if that might work better than a direct connection
• attaching, manually ejecting, rebooting, attaching
• attaching, manually ejecting, shutting down, attaching, rebooting
• on an idea that maybe only the Studio USB-A jacks might have a bug, I ordered a USB-C to USB-B cable and that yields the same too. So the bug seems to affect ALL of the jacks.
• there's several references online to using terminal app option: sudo command to change disk sleep from 10 to the maximum number. Tried that, no difference.
• tried a THIRD USB-A to USB-B cable just in case I happened to have 2 bad ones (even though the primary has worked and continues to work fine with Intel Mac connections)
• every combination of Power Saver options. I think there is probably something there as I can almost make the eject happen by putting it to sleep- but not EVERY time.

I didn't use migration assistant for this new Mac. Instead I have manually installed the apps I use one by one to have the cleanest possible install. Since it is brand new, I'm doubting the PRAM options apply and as a cleanest install, I'm confident I don't have junk stuff migrated from the Intel because I didn't migrate anything.

The LAST thing I could try myself is reformatting it in Monterey, though First Aid confirms nothing wrong and again it works exactly as it should when hooked back up to Intel Macs running earlier macOS versions. It's already in APFS and has been for a few years. I feel like the reformat option will simply have me hooking it and a backup to an old Mac to reload the drive with the same files (about 15TB) to get it back to as it is now.

At this point- through a good effort at process of elimination- I increasingly feel the problem is in Monterey... but am wide open to anything else I could try myself. On Apple support forums, someone suggested that some drives work and some don't but there doesn't seem to be a way to tell WHICH, so it would be a game of consumer roulette trying to guess... then hope it will maintain a stable connection. Besides this is a 2-drive RAID setup and there is less of that kind of input from the "works perfectly fine for me" crowd.

I really want the U in USB to apply here.​

This new Mac cost over $6K and seems "latest-greatest." Of all things that could be wrong with a first-gen device, I would think a standard that has existed for what- 20+ years now- should be well implemented and thoroughly debugged by this point. Didn't those FIRST iMacs come with USB jacks?

Obviously, I'm very frustrated with this situation. I miss "just works."

 

[phrehdd]

Just received my new Mac Studio Ultra. Same external drive issues described in this thread- won't remain consistently mounted... seems to randomly eject and the notification warning about ejecting pops up like I pulled the cord. It will eject on sleep but will also eject if I don't let the Studio go to sleep, such as when consistently using it. It will also eject if I don't let the drive go to sleep, including one ejection WHILE transferring files from it (so definitely not asleep).

SAME drive using the SAME cable hooked back up to Intel Macs running earlier macOS remains connected in a stable state for days... as it did for months at a time before I opted to upgrade to this new Mac Studio.

I purchased this enclosure new in 2018 from OWC. It is a 2-disc RAID box and I purchased both HDDs inside at the same time. RAID-0 makes it 28TB and I have about half that holding mostly media to stream to AppleTVs around the house via home sharing: home movies, DVD/BR collection, etc. Since 2018, it has worked exactly as expected on my Intel iMac. Now I feel lucky if it will remain connected to this Studio for even 3 hours.

I think I've tried everything that a user can try:

• 2 new cables USB-A to USB-B
• testing both USB A jacks on the Studio
• tested 2 reliable hubs in-between to see if that might work better than a direct connection
• attaching, manually ejecting, rebooting, attaching
• attaching, manually ejecting, shutting down, attaching, rebooting
• on an idea that maybe only the Studio USB-A jacks might have a bug, I ordered a USB-C to USB-B cable and that yields the same too. So the bug seems to affect ALL of the jacks.
• there's several references online to using terminal app option: sudo command to change disk sleep from 10 to the maximum number. Tried that, no difference.
• tried a THIRD USB-A to USB-B cable just in case I happened to have 2 bad ones (even though the primary has worked and continues to work fine with Intel Mac connections)
• every combination of Power Saver options. I think there is probably something there as I can almost make the eject happen by putting it to sleep- but not EVERY time.

I didn't use migration assistant for this new Mac. Instead I have manually installed the apps I use one by one to have the cleanest possible install. Since it is brand new, I'm doubting the PRAM options apply and as a cleanest install, I'm confident I don't have junk stuff migrated from the Intel because I didn't migrate anything.

The LAST thing I could try myself is reformatting it in Monterey, though First Aid confirms nothing wrong and again it works exactly as it should when hooked back up to Intel Macs running earlier macOS versions. It's already in APFS and has been for a few years. I feel like the reformat option will simply have me hooking it and a backup to an old Mac to reload the drive with the same files (about 15TB) to get it back to as it is now.

At this point- through a good effort at process of elimination- I increasingly feel the problem is in Monterey... but am wide open to anything else I could try myself. On Apple support forums, someone suggested that some drives work and some don't but there doesn't seem to be a way to tell WHICH, so it would be a game of consumer roulette trying to guess... then hope it will maintain a stable connection. Besides this is a 2-drive RAID setup and there is less of that kind of input from the "works perfectly fine for me" crowd.

I really want the U in USB to apply here.​

This new Mac cost over $6K and seems "latest-greatest." Of all things that could be wrong with a first-gen device, I would think a standard that has existed for what- 20+ years now- should be well implemented and thoroughly debugged by this point. Didn't those FIRST iMacs come with USB jacks?

Obviously, I'm very frustrated with this situation. I miss "just works."

Will an external SSD drive remain accessible or a thumdrive? I ask as any external device that has drives that can spin down can be problematic and disconnect when in sleep mode or similar. I recall this was an issue with my NAS if an application tried to engage it from my Mac when the drives were not spun up. I ended up with a script that would pretty much get the NAS spun up then engaged it with my apps etc. I mention the thumbdrive and SSD to see if your RAID unit is the challenge with drive having spun down due to no communication with your Mac.

 

[HobeSoundDarryl]

Thanks for the suggestion. I have been using both USB drives and SSDs but only in short spans of time: connect, move some files, disconnect. This RAID is long-term storage, holding movies, TV shows, etc for AppleTVs. It has remained connected for several YEARS to the Intel Mac this Studio is replacing... but that Mac was running an earlier version of macOS. Nevertheless, any RAID hardware spin down sleeps causing disconnection seems like it should have been doing this with the former Mac too. It wasn't. That was super stable.

And even now, I can unhook it from this Studio and hook it back up to my Intel Macs and leave it for many hours with no disconnections: same cable, same RAID, same format, same USB type connection. That's what has me thinking either:

• Studio hardware- but that would imply ALL of the jacks now that I've also tried linking to USB-C jacks and that failed to remain connected to them too OR
• Monterey bug(s)- which seems to be the common thread for many others who have also posted this issue, here, on Apple support site and in other forums online. Hunting for solutions has led me to suspect something in Big Sur and Monterey is most likely. The reliable Mac predecessor was running a pre-Big Sur version of macOS.

I'll try some single drive connections and leave them connected for similar lengths of time. I presume that's working well for many, else this issue would be "louder." I don't have much single drive hardware as my external storage has grown beyond single drive sizes, but I have a few old ones and can try.

However, whatever comes of it, I'll still need the RAID setup to work and don't have any ways to tweak that hardware if I can shift some potential blame back in that direction. I have 15TB of storage on that box and sometimes use the other 13TBs as scratch space when rendering pro-res files, etc. I'm not going to be thrilled with having to buy new hardware and maybe two 16-20TB single drives to try to replicate what I already have... and already works fine with Intel Macs.

But I've (process of) eliminated a number of possibilities, so might as well as least try some single drive connections and see if any of them surprise eject in a similar way.

 

[phrehdd]

Thanks for the suggestion. I have been using both USB drives and SSDs but only in short spans of time: connect, move some files, disconnect. This RAID is long-term storage, holding movies, TV shows, etc for AppleTVs. It has remained connected for several YEARS to the Intel Mac this Studio is replacing... but that Mac was running an earlier version of macOS. Nevertheless, any RAID hardware spin down sleeps causing disconnection seems like it should have been doing this with the former Mac too. It wasn't. That was super stable.

And even now, I can unhook it from this Studio and hook it back up to my Intel Macs and leave it for many hours with no disconnections: same cable, same RAID, same format, same USB type connection. That's what has me thinking either:

• Studio hardware- but that would imply ALL of the jacks now that I've also tried linking to USB-C jacks and that failed to remain connected to them too OR
• Monterey bug(s)- which seems to be the common thread for many others who have also posted this issue, here, on Apple support site and in other forums online. Hunting for solutions has led me to suspect something in Big Sur and Monterey is most likely. The reliable Mac predecessor was running a pre-Big Sur version of macOS.

I'll try some single drive connections and leave them connected for similar lengths of time. I presume that's working well for many, else this issue would be "louder." I don't have much single drive hardware as my external storage has grown beyond single drive sizes, but I have a few old ones and can try.

However, whatever comes of it, I'll still need the RAID setup to work and don't have any ways to tweak that hardware if I can shift some potential blame back in that direction. I have 15TB of storage on that box and sometimes use the other 13TBs as scratch space when rendering pro-res files, etc. I'm not going to be thrilled with having to buy new hardware and maybe two 16-20TB single drives to try to replicate what I already have... and already works fine with Intel Macs.

But I've (process of) eliminated a number of possibilities, so might as well as least try some single drive connections and see if any of them surprise eject in a similar way.

Are you sure that on your other macs that the RAID is really doing spin down? It of course can be possible that upon waking, the older OS reinitializes the ports while Monterey may not.
1) If older systems continue to communicate with RAID during "sleep" then there is no spin down.
2) If older system upon wake re-initialize ports then RAID may too be initialized (spin up)

Would any of this apply? I am asking and curious.

 

[HobeSoundDarryl]

OK, while it's only a single test, I left a USB stick and 2 single drives (SSD and HDD) attached for about 9 hours and they all remain attached after Studio sleep... implying that maybe Monterey (or Studio but probably not Studio) may mostly have an issue with RAID attachments. I already know it can't be the ONE box because there are MANY posts about unexpected drive ejections online in many places and I heavily doubt they all own this ONE RAID box.

This box is not ancient technology- purchased new in 2018- and again, it has worked perfectly fine with Intel Macs through the same cable right up until I replaced the Mac with a new Studio. What changed: Studio Mac running Monterey vs. Intel Mac running High Sierra. As one more test, I had another Mac running Catalina- hooked it to this RAID for about 12 hours, did some sleep-awake testing, and it remained attached as expected.

So now I'm curious. Anyone out there have a DAS (not NAS) attached RAID box connected via USB and maintaining a steady connection even through Mac Silicon sleep cycles? If so, what specific brand/model as maybe I can buy that bare bones, move these 2 HDDs, reload them with the files and have dependable RAID storage again? If any replies are you RAID configured to share the drives (RAID 0-10) instead of using them separately in a RAID enclosure (like JBOD)?

While this single-drive test likely rules out Studio jack issues and can easily cast some additional potential on the RAID device, there's no solid solution here. I have 28TB in that RAID and I'd like to continue to be able to use that. So I can't resolve this issue by buying a dedicated 28TB HDD or SSD single drive since none exist. For a band-aid solution I could pick up 2 single drive enclosures and spread the 15TB over 2 drives with 14TB for scratch disk jobs on a single drive... but I'm not loving the idea of having to spend more to make external storage work with a "latest-greatest" Mac... when this same box worked perfectly fine with the former Mac.

I increasingly suspect that if I want that much storage, THAT (buy new enclosures and not have a RAID setup) becomes the move until- I presume- Apple gets around to detecting some (I suspect) bug(s) in Monterey that is causing this. Of course, I can do that if I must but again, I miss "just works" Apple.


To your questions phrehdd:

1. Intel Mac would definitely go to sleep. I don't have doubts about that. And it would not "force eject" this RAID box while it was asleep. I had nightly sleep schedule on and would often be present right at the moment when it would go to sleep (countdown clock on screen). I also use some software like Handbrake with the option to "put computer to sleep when complete" and that seemed to work with each successful render: render complete, computer immediately goes to sleep.

This is a bit of a noisy box. So when any attached Mac goes to sleep, it makes a noticeable sound itself which- to my ears- does sound like hard drives spinning down, followed by silence. I have always assumed that was the RAID going to sleep too. What I do NOT hear while either kind of Mac is asleep is the sounds of spinning hard drives. With this box, when they are spinning, there are sounds.

2. Perhaps? How could I tell this for sure? When I would wake the Intel Mac (or this Studio) and the RAID is not unexpectedly ejected, I would hear the sounds that I've always assumed was "spinning up." However, the drive icon itself was/is still visible immediately when the screen comes on. In other words, it does not appear to be disconnected and then is reconnecting on wake up as if I've just connected the cable or just turned it on like I'm plugging in a new drive. My perception has always been that it simply sleeps and wakes with the Mac but that there is a steady link between the two while both sleep.

The key difference is that NOW- on wake- I can almost consistently see the unexpected ejection notification. That almost NEVER happened with the prior Mac over several years.

AND, it is important to note that this doesn't seem to only be a SLEEP issue. In doing some of these tests, I've been using the Mac without it going to sleep for sure. Several times the eject notification pops while actively using the Mac.

AND, at least THREE times now, I was moving some big files FROM the RAID so it was definitely not asleep as it was actively sending some files to the also-awake Mac and it ejected mid-transfer... very much like pulling the cord during a transfer.

So there seems to be a pretty good correlation between something sleeping and this event but that's not the only time it happens: it will unexpectedly eject while both Mac and RAID are definitely awake too.

 

[phrehdd]

OK, while it's only a single test, I left a USB stick and 2 single drives (SSD and HDD) attached for about 9 hours and they all remain attached after Studio sleep... implying that maybe Monterey (or Studio but probably not Studio) may mostly have an issue with RAID attachments. I already know it can't be the ONE box because there are MANY posts about unexpected drive ejections online in many places and I heavily doubt they all own this ONE RAID box.

This box is not ancient technology- purchased new in 2018- and again, it has worked perfectly fine with Intel Macs through the same cable right up until I replaced the Mac with a new Studio. What changed: Studio Mac running Monterey vs. Intel Mac running High Sierra. As one more test, I had another Mac running Catalina- hooked it to this RAID for about 12 hours, did some sleep-awake testing, and it remained attached as expected.

So now I'm curious. Anyone out there have a DAS (not NAS) attached RAID box connected via USB and maintaining a steady connection even through Mac Silicon sleep cycles? If so, what specific brand/model as maybe I can buy that bare bones, move these 2 HDDs, reload them with the files and have dependable RAID storage again? If any replies are you RAID configured to share the drives (RAID 0-10) instead of using them separately in a RAID enclosure (like JBOD)?

While this single-drive test likely rules out Studio jack issues and can easily cast some additional potential on the RAID device, there's no solid solution here. I have 28TB in that RAID and I'd like to continue to be able to use that. So I can't resolve this issue by buying a dedicated 28TB HDD or SSD single drive since none exist. For a band-aid solution I could pick up 2 single drive enclosures and spread the 15TB over 2 drives with 14TB for scratch disk jobs on a single drive... but I'm not loving the idea of having to spend more to make external storage work with a "latest-greatest" Mac... when this same box worked perfectly fine with the former Mac.

I increasingly suspect that if I want that much storage, THAT (buy new enclosures and not have a RAID setup) becomes the move until- I presume- Apple gets around to detecting some (I suspect) bug(s) in Monterey that is causing this. Of course, I can do that if I must but again, I miss "just works" Apple.


To your questions phrehdd:

1. Intel Mac would definitely go to sleep. I don't have doubts about that. And it would not "force eject" this RAID box while it was asleep. I had nightly sleep schedule on and would often be present right at the moment when it would go to sleep (countdown clock on screen). I also use some software like Handbrake with the option to "put computer to sleep when complete" and that seemed to work with each successful render: render complete, computer immediately goes to sleep.

This is a bit of a noisy box. So when any attached Mac goes to sleep, it makes a noticeable sound itself which- to my ears- does sound like hard drives spinning down, followed by silence. I have always assumed that was the RAID going to sleep too. What I do NOT hear while either kind of Mac is asleep is the sounds of spinning hard drives. With this box, when they are spinning, there are sounds.

2. Perhaps? How could I tell this for sure? When I would wake the Intel Mac (or this Studio) and the RAID is not unexpectedly ejected, I would hear the sounds that I've always assumed was "spinning up." However, the drive icon itself was/is still visible immediately when the screen comes on. In other words, it does not appear to be disconnected and then is reconnecting on wake up as if I've just connected the cable or just turned it on like I'm plugging in a new drive. My perception has always been that it simply sleeps and wakes with the Mac but that there is a steady link between the two while both sleep.

The key difference is that NOW- on wake- I can almost consistently see the unexpected ejection notification. That almost NEVER happened with the prior Mac over several years.

AND, it is important to note that this doesn't seem to only be a SLEEP issue. In doing some of these tests, I've been using the Mac without it going to sleep for sure. Several times the eject notification pops while actively using the Mac.

AND, at least THREE times, I was moving some big files FROM the RAID so it was definitely not asleep as it was actively sending some files to the also-awake Mac and it did this mid-transfer... very much like pulling the cord during a transfer.

So there seems to be a pretty good correlation between something sleeping and this event but that's no the only time it happens: it will unexpectedly eject while both Mac and RAID are definitely awake too.

Thanks for the thorough response.

For me, I use a Caldigit Element with two SSD - 1 TB4/USB4 and one USB-C 3.1. Both work well and continuously recognized. However, I did have a couple of times minor hiccups.

When I spoke about the NAS, when the drives had spun down and my Mac wanted to engage a file with an app, if the drives didn't spin up fast enough, the app would fail. If I simply "clicked" on or command line initialized, the drives would spin up and then* I would use the app. Again, a script came in handy for this purpose. All the time however, the NAS did appear on the network.

A couple of things come to mind - I recall years ago some issues with video where having an intermediate between the monitor and computer that continuously presented an "edid" would keep the monitor's properly resolution as it would indicate to the computer the resolution desired and that kept the monitor adjusted properly. I sometimes wonder if similar could be said for your situation where a good dock might do better than directly connected to the Mac (your RAID). Your Mac only knows what the dock is defining rather than the actual items (RAID in your case).

Last - Monterey and M1 have been a continued problem with my monitor when I use USB-C to Displayport. My monitor is set for 60 hertz and as I have mentioned a few times before in forums, it somehow switches itself to "40-60 hrtz" which causes mild flickering. I have to reset it constantly. The cable is good and the monitor Benq PD2700u.

 

[HobeSoundDarryl]

Yes, I went through the idea of intermediary and have since tried all of the dock options that I have: 3 different ones that all seem to work as intended. In all 3 cases, Studio to Dock to RAID didn't seem to make any difference. I had this idea that maybe the power-sipping nature of Silicon chips might not be optimized to maintain a sufficient level for some external drives. So the concept was that perhaps a separately-powered hub/dock as "middleman" would maintain some level of power necessary to keep attached devices connected. However, testing all 3: Studio through (1 self-powered, 2 separately powered) dock/hub to (also powered) RAID still led to the same result: unexpected ejections.

And yes, I continue to suspect a buggy Monterey. Unfortunately with a new Mac Studio, I can't downgrade to a previous macOS version, so it seems like I have to join the "hope a future file update fixes this problem" crowd.

Unlike your drives, I am connecting through an older USB type- TYPE B (USB 3.1)- as that is the only option with this box. So I can't readily test a RAID box with USB C or Thunderbolt jacks without buying a new box. It could be that Apple has perhaps turned some page about fully supporting RAID things without USB C/Thunderbolt jacks??? I don't know. Only Apple knows.

Here's hoping Monterey .4 update maybe comes with a bunch of bug fixes along these lines. I have to think there are many Studio buyers who need BIG attached storage and at least a good chunk of them need RAID big.

 

[Joobs333]

Has anyone reported this issue to apple? I have a similar issue with a WD elements 12 tb drive.

I replaced a smaller WD drive with this drive when I started getting drive issues after buying a macbook pro 14 inch 2021.

The drive will be stable and then after a while it will oscillate between sleep mode and waking up every minute, unless you are constantly reading or writing.......How are there not more people throwing a stink about this issue, it seems like it would be systemic as tons of professionals use the wd elements drives as their workhorses.......Like others on here, I have a strong feeling that this is not a drive issue but an operating system/new hardware issue.......I never had these problems on my macbook air 2015.