1. Pegasus2 R4 Promise Utility For Mac Rebuild Raid Software
2. Pegasus2 R4 Promise Utility For Mac Rebuild Raid Pack

Table of Contents
Section I. Identifying the Pegasus Model and Specifications
A. Pegasus3 Models
B. Pegasus2 Models

Section II. Creating Disk Array and Logical Drive
A. Example with macOS
B. Example with macOS with APFS
C. Example with Windows

Description: This article will illustrate to all Pegasus customers on how to configure a Pegasus from scratch.

Providing a perfect entry point for users needing HW RAID protection with adequate capacity, the PROMISE Pegasus32 R4 series RAID storage system brings the power of Thunderbolt 3 technology to a wide range of Mac users. You will need to open Disk Utility then go to - File - RAID assistance. Create a stripe with both the R4i logical volume and the Pegasus32 R4. Once the RAID stripe is created we benchmarked. Test Software: Blackmagic Design, Disk Speed Test 3.2. Test Hardware: Mac Pro 2019 8 core Xeon, 32gb ECC DIMMs, 580x Module, Pegasus J2i 1 x 8TB 7200rpm. Pegasus R6, R4 Product Manual 4 Client OS Support The following client operating systems support the Pegasus unit:. Mac OS 10.6 and higher. MacBook Pro/iMac Software Update 1.5 Utility OS Support The following client operating systems support the Promise Utility:. Mac OS 10.6 and higher. MacBook Pro/iMac Software Update 1.5. Mar 07, 2017 I took it out of the Pegasus R4 case, put it into an external USB drive enclosure, reformatted it from my Mac, took it out of the external drive enclosure and put it back into the Pegasus R4 case. Note: I was too nervous to try reformatting that physical drive with the Promise Utility while it was still inside of the R4 case. Symptoms: The Pegasus is showing no problems; WebPAM or Promise Utility gives all green checkmarks, Disk Utility will show 'Promise RAID' volume as mounted and it will pass verify disk, but Finder still doesn't see the volume. You might be able to browse to your external volume directly at the Terminal command prompt, or with the Finder option.

Section I. Identifying the Pegasus Model and Specifications
Note: Review the tables below indicating which RAID levels each Pegasus Model supports.
A. Pegasus3 Models

Pegasus3 Specifications Table

For the full specifications table for the Pegasus3 Series, please download the datasheet.

B. Pegasus2 Models

Pegasus2 Specifications Table

For the full specifications table for the Pegasus2 Series, please download the datasheet.

Section II. Creating Disk Array and Logical Drive
A. Example with macOS

1. Open the Promise Pegasus Utility.
2. Unlock the Utility by click in on the lock icon
3. In order to make any changes to the Pegasus, the utility must be unlocked
4. Click on the Physical Drive icon to get the list of the disks.
5. You want to ensure that all the drives (or the drives that you want to use for your new array) have a Configuration Status as Unconfigured:
   
6. Once you've verified that all the drives have a Configuration Status of Unconfigured, proceed to the Disk Array icon. There should be no configured disk arrays in the subsystem.
   
7. Click on Create Disk Array
   
8. You will be brought to the Disk Array sub-menu.
   A. Input the Alias label (i.e. MyArray01)
   B. Ensure that Media Patrol and PDM (Predictive Data Migration) are enabled.
   C. Media Type will be Hard Disk Drive for non-SSD SATA drives.
   
9. Select the drives you will allocate to the array. In this example, all (8) drives are being used in this illustration.
   Device in Example: Pegasus3 R8
   
10. Click Submit and you will receive a message that the disk array was created successfully.
    A. Click Finish
    
    
11. You will be presented back to the Disk Array menu with the Status of your Disk Array.
    
12. Click on the Logical Drive icon.
    A. Click on Create Logical Drive.
    
13. In the Logical Drive sub-menu, locate the array you created on step 10.
    A. Ensure the radio button is selected next to the array that you will use to configure the Logical Drive.
    B. Once confirmed, click Next.
    
14. You will be presented with the Create Logical Drive sub-menu. In this screen you will be able to dictate the settings for your Logical Drive.
    Note: Carefully elect the options that best suits your environment's need.
    You can modify the following parameters in this screen:
    A. Alias – Alias of Logical Drive
    B. RAID Level – RAID Level of your Logical Drive
    C. Capacity – The size you want to allocate to the Logical Drive.
    D. Stripe – The Stripe Size of your Logical Drive.
    You can choose a stripe size of 64 KB, 128 KB, 256 KB, 512 KB, and 1 MB.
    E. Sector – The Sector Size (512 Bytes is the most common sector size and the default used)
    F. Read Policy
    

    Read Cache	The read cache is enabled but no pre-fetch action.
    Read Ahead	The read cache and predictive pre-fetch feature are enabled.
    No Cache	The read cache is disabled

    
    G. Write Policy
    

    Write Back	Data is written first to the cache, then to the logical drive. This provides better performance.
    Write Thru	Also 'Write Through.' Data is written to the cache and the logical drive at the same time. This is safer.

    
    I. Format - If you leave the checkbox selected, it will format the volume HFS+ and automatically mount the volume on your machine.
    
15. Input your desired parameters and click Add.
    
    
16. Once you've clicked Add, your Logical Drive will be presented under the New Logical Drives section. Verify your settings and click Submit.
    
17. You will wait a few seconds for the Logical Drive to initialize and it will be presented to the main Logical Drive menu. You will see the Status of the Logical Drive as Synchronizing.
    
18. You can always check the status of the Synchronization process under:
    Background and Activities > Synchronization
    
    
19. You will see the HFS+ Volume labeled as Promise RAID. The name of the volume can be changed.
    

B. Example with macOS with APFS

Formatting a Filesystem with Disk Utility (Without the format option in the Pegasus Utility)

1. If you would like to create an APFS volume or simply elect not to have the utility format your filesystem with the Pegasus Utility, create your Logical Drive without the Format checkbox selected. (Repeat steps 1-17)
2. Use will need to initialize your disk manually. Click Initialize to open Disk Utility.
   
3. In Disk Utility, locate and select the Logical Drive you created. The drive will state Uninitialized.
   Click the Erase icon on the top menu to begin the initialization process.
   
4. Select the desired filesystem format. In this example, we are illustrating standard APFS.
   Click Erase.
   
5. You will receive a dialogue once the formatting has completed successfully.
   Click Done.
   
6. You have now created an APFS volume and is ready for use.
   

C. Example with Windows

1. Open the Promise Pegasus Utility.
2. Click on the Physical Drive icon to get the list of the disks.
3. You want to ensure that all the drives (or the drives that you want to use for your new array) have a Configuration Status as Unconfigured:
   
4. Once you've verified that all the drives have a Configuration Status of Unconfigured, proceed to the Disk Array icon. There should be no configured disk arrays in the subsystem.
   
5. Click on Create Disk Array
   
6. You will be brought to the Disk Array sub-menu.
   A. Input the Alias label (i.e. MyArray01)
   B. Ensure that Media Patrol and PDM (Predictive Data Migration) are enabled.
   C. Media Type will be Hard Disk Drive for non-SSD SATA drives.
   
7. Select the drives you will allocate to the array. In this example, all (8) drives are being used in this illustration.
   Device in Example: Pegasus3 R8
   
8. Click Submit and you will receive a message that the disk array was created successfully.
   A. Click Finish.
   
9. You will be presented back to the Disk Array menu with the Status of your Disk Array.
   
10. Click on the Logical Drive icon.
    A. Click on Create Logical Drive.
    
11. In the Logical Drive sub-menu, locate the array you created on step 8.
    A. Ensure the radio button is selected next to the array that you will use to configure the Logical Drive.
    B. Once confirmed, click Next.
    
12. You will be presented with the Create Logical Drive sub-menu. In this screen you will be able to dictate the settings for your Logical Drive.
    Note: Carefully elect the options that best suits your environment's need.
    You can modify the following parameters in this screen:
    A. Alias – Alias of Logical Drive
    B. RAID Level – RAID Level of your Logical Drive
    C. Capacity – The size you want to allocate to the Logical Drive.
    D. Stripe – The Stripe Size of your Logical Drive.
    You can choose a stripe size of 64 KB, 128 KB, 256 KB, 512 KB, and 1 MB.
    E. Sector – The Sector Size (512 Bytes is the most common sector size and the default used)
    F. Read Policy
    

    Read Cache	The read cache is enabled but no pre-fetch action.
    Read Ahead	The read cache and predictive pre-fetch feature are enabled.
    No Cache	The read cache is disabled

    
    G. Write Policy
    

    Write Back	Data is written first to the cache, then to the logical drive. This provides better performance.
    Write Thru	Also 'Write Through.' Data is written to the cache and the logical drive at the same time. This is safer.

    
    I. Format - If you leave the checkbox selected, it will format the volume NTFS and automatically mount the volume on your machine.
    
13. Input your desired parameters and click Add.
    
14. Once you've clicked Add, your Logical Drive will be presented under the New Logical Drives section. Verify your settings and click Submit.
    
15. You will wait a few seconds for the Logical Drive to initialize and it will be presented to the main Logical Drive menu. You will see the Status of the Logical Drive as Synchronizing.
    
16. You can always check the status of the Synchronization process under:
    Admin > Background and Activities > Synchronization
    
17. You will see the NTFS volumed labeled as PromiseRAID under Devices and Drives in This PC.
    The name of the volume can be changed.
    A. Properties of NTFS volume:
    
18. Viewing the volume in Computer Management > Disk Management:
    

Related Articles:
How to Convert an NTFS Formatted Pegasus3 to Journaled HFS+ on macOS

Pegasus2 R4 Promise Utility For Mac Rebuild Raid Software

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The Promise Utility will advise you which HDD module failed and you need to make a note of that Bay slot number before turning the system off. Follow these instructions

Prior to beginning the steps please make sure you are using the latest Promise Utility. You can download the Promise Utilty here.

Go ahead and Open the Promise Utility

Soon as you open the Promise Utility it will scream something is wrong. Note**If you see this informational message below, we advise to not accept and then shut down the Mac Pro 2019, finally, reseat the Promise R4i hard drives. There could be a slight chance that the drive did not detect on boot. Reseating and rebooting your Mac Pro will sometimes correct these problem. However; if this screen pops up again, please accept continue with the steps as there could be a dead drive.

Once you've accepted you will notice in the home page dashboard, under the label 'system status', the disk array and logical drive have an 'red circle' on each of them. If you look under the label 'storage overview' you can see that there are 3 drives listed. In the label 'Event Information' you will notice the Logical drive has been set to critical due to the missing drive.

We will confirm the drive is dead by checking the other settings.

Under the Physical Drive Icon you will notice that a Physical Drive is missing from the list.

Pegasus2 R4 Promise Utility For Mac Rebuild Raid Pack

In this image we are looking at the Disk Array information. Notice the operational status as Degraded.

In this image is the logical drive. The operational status is 'critical' which means that the volume is usuable, but if another drive fails than it will be catastrophic.

Now we've identified that the drive is indeed failed.

Go to the icon --> Disk Array --> highlight select disk array --> than to the far right there are three dots to extend the options. Click on the rebuild and proceed to accept.

Once the rebuild has begun you can monitor the rebuild in the daskboard.

3Please note** If the rebuild does not appear or fails, contact support immediately. Support contact information -> https://support.promise.com/, or call 408 228 1400 option 4

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