Diskmanagement.disenter error 49218

[elgato2024]

Diskmanagement.disenter error 49218​

external drives sporadically refuse to mount.
when trying manually in the diskutil, this is the error I get.

happening on various OS- and CPU-versions with various apfs-disks.
solution: reboot.

discomforting. annoying. especially since os-shutdown takes ages when this happens.
since macos11.
**** like that should be fixed!!!
an os that cannot reliably deal with mass storage is just about dead.

tons of threads about this can be found, no proper solutions though.
like here: https://developer.apple.com/forums/thread/695361
anybody knows what's going on?

 

[bogdanw]

Don't use APFS if you don't have to.
It's bad
apfs_fs_alloc_count is not valid https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/disc-utility-warning.2376773/
"physical object not prepared before dirtying" kernel panic?! https://forums.macrumors.com/thread...repared-before-dirtying-kernel-panic.2340560/
"warning: file has compression bsdflags, but doesn't have the compression xattr"
https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/help-with-fsck-file-ids-anyone.2353076/
cannot be mounted & trash can't be emptied https://forums.macrumors.com/thread...ot-mounted-and-trash-cant-be-emptied.2383291/

 

[elgato2024]

hey bogdanw, thx for your reply.

you mean generally on ext. hd-drives?

what is apfs meant for, then? just internal ssds?

or do you advise against using apfs altogether?

wasn't apfs sold as the new filesystem for all?
and if so, are they working on fixing it?

the timemachine forces apfs conversion also on hdds, right?

 

[bogdanw]

macOS can now only be installed on APFS.
I don’t use TimeMachine, I don’t know what it requires.
I use external drives formated as HFS+ (Journaled HFS Plus) for macOS and as ExFat for macOS, Windows and Android.

 

[Brian33]

what is apfs meant for, then? just internal ssds?

Well, one can never tell what Apple means, ha ha, but I don't think its meant only for internal SSDs. I've seen nothing to indicate that.

the timemachine forces apfs conversion also on hdds, right?

In recent versions of macOS (I think beginning with Big Sur?), if you tell TM to back up to a "new" disk (one that doesn't have a pre-existing TM backup on it), then yes, TM will re-format the drive as APFS, no matter what format you had used to initialize it. Both SSDs and HDDs will be reformatted to APFS in this case.

If you tell TM to back up to a HFS+ disk that has a pre-existing TM backup on it, then TM will continue to back up to that HFS+ formatted disk. That's what I've read, anyway -- I haven't tried it.

 

[elgato2024]

macOS can now only be installed on APFS.
I don’t use TimeMachine, I don’t know what it requires.
I use external drives formated as HFS+ (Journaled HFS Plus) for macOS and as ExFat for macOS, Windows and Android.

can I ask you what you use for backups then?

 

[bogdanw]

can I ask you what you use for backups then?

Copy-paste. I copy the files/folders to an external drive.

 

[elgato2024]

that's it?? what, in finder?
any reasons why you use no backup software such as carboncopycloner?

 

[jotzet]

Hi,

I don't know if this helps with your (external enclosure) cases, but it's worth a try: SWAP THE CABLE!!!

I was using USB 3.1 cable from Amazon Basics, swapped it with a cheap no-name USB 3.0 cable (USB-C to USB-A) and it has been super reliable so far (exhaustive testing still needed though).

Equipment:

• iMac14,2 iMac Late 2013 27'', nVidia 780M Kepler, running Monterey / Ventura / Sonoma (well OCLP powered)
• USB 3.1 Enclosure RaidSonic IcyBox IB-247-C31 (need to look up the Chipset yet)
• Samsung 870 QVO SATA III 2,5'' SSD 4TB

Steps to reproduce the failure

• Mount (faulty) Drive using USB 3.1 cable
• Format Drive with APFS
• Create some folders & copy small files
• Unmount Drive
• Mount Drive again
• Everything fails now: Repair / Read from macOS
• Mount (faulty) Drive using (no-name) USB 3.0 cable
• Format Drive with APFS
• Create some folders & copy small files
• Unmount Drive
• Mount Drive again (super fast BTW)
• Everything is working now: Repair / ReadWrite within macOS / Unmount&Mount x-times
• Unmount Drive
• Mount (healthy) Drive using USB 3.1 cable
• Unmount Drive
• Mount Drive again
• Everything fails now again: Repair / Read from macOS

Several actions undertaken to resolve the situation

• Formatting in User Mode / Reformatting several times
• Different Formatting types: HFS+ / APFS / ExFAT / MSDOS FAT (tried but bot succeeded, not possible due to TB restrictions)
• Repairing / Formatting under macOS
• Formatting under Linux (Debian)
• Repairing / Formatting in Recovery Mode

Background

• I really tried dozens of different things (see above): So I assume either the cable stopped working properly or the underlying macOS USB-Kext functionality changed causing malfunctions when connecting SSDs & formatting them with HFS+ or APFS, in an external USB enclosure.
• I was "outsourcing" more or less all larger data sets to an external USB drive: i.e. 300GB Apple Photo.library (Originals) / unmanaged (=folder struct) Photo Archive which resembles my whole Picture arsenal, Documents, "unnecessary" Music files, "staging" files for video processing I still wanted to process.
• I used the external exclosure with USB 3.1. successfully for months back in 2020. BUT all of a sudden I was having problems when updating to a newer macOS version and impatiently plugged the SSD cable without removing / ejecting the drive properly. Hell, I was pissed, had partial access to my files (via iPad connectivity AND creating a Disk Image which I stored to another very LARGE external disk) though. BUT: Some files were not recoverable as they were filled with ZEROES (I assume this was due to the fact that I didn't unplug the drive - I guess it was reorganising internal structures back then: which then caused TRIM function to erase parts of the file system).
• I waited until this error would have been fixed by Apples own DiskUtility Tools, but this dream never came true.

Hope this helps some of you poor lads out there too...
bR Joachim