How do I reformat the drives and create a new Raid 5

Via RAIDar 4.3.8 you can select to do a secure erase when doing a factory default. This secure erase will take several hours. Note that if you abort this secure erase the disks will be locked. If the disks are locked the NAS will do a factory reset every reboot.

Good day mdgm and thank you for your response. I managed to install RAIDar 4.3.8 for MAC and launch the program. I select "Rescan" and it correctly identifies my NAS. If I select the "Setup" button, it opens up the Admin page in my web browser, which is the same page I see when I log into the NAS. The "Format" button is greyed out.

If I perform a factory reset boot (per the manual), will the results be secure enough? In looking at the boot menu options there doesn't seem to be an option for secure erase.

Thanks

I think the option comes up when you select factory default on the boot menu, then go to raidar during the timeout.
You could take each disk, connect it to your Mac and run other erase software.
I don't think there is much evidence that you need to do more than the readynas secure erase would do.

What new model did you purchase? You might be able to shut down the new model, remove all it's disks, and then use it to secure erase the old ones.

I want to thank everyone who contributed to this topic. In the end I was able to reboot to factory settings and via RAIDar, secure erase the disks and then set up the raid array using x-raid 2.

Many thanks