I have forgotten what terminal emulation to use for this situation. I am trying to run lsblk on a proxmox host,
I can make out what the results are, however in a remote ssh session some of the characters are ???????

I don't remember, but there is one emulation that will display properly.

lsblk
NAME MAJ:MIN RM SIZE RO TYPE MOUNTPOINT
sda 8:0 0 1.8T 0 disk
├─sda1 8:1 0 1007K 0 part
├─sda2 8:2 0 512M 0 part
└─sda3 8:3 0 1.8T 0 part
├─pve-swap 253:5 0 7G 0 lvm [SWAP]
├─pve-root 253:6 0 96G 0 lvm /
├─pve-data_tmeta 253:7 0 15.8G 0 lvm
│ └─pve-data-tpool 253:9 0 1.7T 0 lvm
│ └─pve-data 253:10 0 1.7T 0 lvm
└─pve-data_tdata 253:8 0 1.7T 0 lvm
└─pve-data-tpool 253:9 0 1.7T 0 lvm
└─pve-data 253:10 0 1.7T 0 lvm
sdb 8:16 0 5.5T 0 disk
└─sdb1 8:17 0 5.5T 0 part
sdc 8:32 0 3.7T 0 disk
└─sdc1 8:33 0 3.7T 0 part
└─data2-vm--101--disk--0 253:0 0 210G 0 lvm
sdd 8:48 0 3.7T 0 disk
└─sdd1 8:49 0 3.7T 0 part

I use cifs, as I have a samba server with loads of space, just another option.

@scottalanmiller no, the end of the open source, specifically the GUI (web mail) for users.

thanks for your comments, now I have to go and re-arrange my prejudices

@scottalanmiller so basically, it has turned into a trust issue, based upon their previous behaviour. I am trying to
decide which distribution to use, as I need to build a new zimbra server( yes, I am aware of Zimbra's announcement going forward), I have almost 2 years to come up with a solution, but in the meantime..... I have an aversion to Ubuntu, but that is
based upon an experience I had a few years ago. I do like Debian, as for most of my deployments, I don't need 'bleeding edge". Any Suggestions ?

@scottalanmiller Does Red Hat's announcement of Feb. 1/2021 change anybodies opinion ?

the next thought is a faulty miniSAS SFF-8087 to 4x SATA cable but why would the WD gold drive work ?

@Dashrender clearly stated earlier in the thread, 'raid controller firmware is current'

this is from the both drives, (alleged failed drive & new drive) after attaching to external usb device on the same server, using "parted"

Model: WDC WD40 EFRX-68N32N0 (scsi)
Disk /dev/sdd: 4001GB
Sector size (logical/physical): 512B/512B
Partition Table: gpt
Disk Flags:

Number  Start   End     Size    File system  Name                          Flags
 1      17.4kB  16.8MB  16.8MB               Microsoft reserved partition  msftres
 2      16.8MB  4001GB  4001GB  ntfs         Basic data partition          msftdata


Error: /dev/sdd: unrecognised disk label
Model: WDC WD40 EFRX-68N32N0 (scsi)                                       
Disk /dev/sdd: 4001GB
Sector size (logical/physical): 512B/512B
Partition Table: unknown

@DustinB3403 I have my doubts about that with this controller. I have used a variety of LSI/3ware controllers
over the years, and have never experienced that, in fact have attached previously used formatted hard drives sans issue. nonetheless, the hard drive was new (straight out of the bag). I will test with
another lsi raid controller and see, thanks

@Pete-S as mentioned earlier in this thread, attached to a windows pc, and performs as one would expect.
even ran some of Western Digital's tools (data life guard) on the drive, no issues.

@scottalanmiller I thought so, i thought I would add that bit about the controller. I couldn't find
any firmware available at all on the wd site. the new drive shows a date of 01 Nov. 2020
I have another lsi 9750 4i , so I may put that in another pc and see if I get the same result.