Focusrite Scarlett 2i4 2nd Gen

I'm hoping someone can give some advice on this. Sorry to be so long winded but I need to explain my experience so far.

So I just bought one of the above to replace my ageing M Audio Fast Track Pro. I installed it as instructed and plugged my monitors in with TRS leads exactly as I had with the FTP but initially I only was getting audio from the headphone. After numerous restarts with no success I decided to flip the leads around. I got audio from the left channel which I found rather odd. I flipped them back around and blow me if I didn't get audio from both channels........really odd! I'd already contacted Focusrite support and the retailer so flicked another email to say it was now working but I'm not convinced there isn't a problem given the odd behavior.

Anyhoos I start to use the device with Sonar Platinum and Reason 9 and straight away I'm getting crackling during play back. My buffer with the FTP was set at 128 and was never a problem. I've increased the buffer of the Scarlett to 512 and still getting crackles

Does anyone on here own one of these? I'm beginning to think the unit may be faulty. Any input would be greatly appreciated.

Cheers

Mark

vdd
There are two experiences I made with the Scarlett interface that match with what you describe:
1: Do not use a Hub! It should not be a problem in theory, but I got massive problems after using one and sharing the connection with a MIDI controller.
2: Please check if you have activated "Recording", "Normal", or "Mixing" within the ASIO control panel. These settings have great impact, because these settings changing the ASIO buffers. You can see that in SONAR: The reported latency in samples is not the same as the buffer you took. Going under a RTL of ~ 15ms will be a challenge with this interface.
 
Best advice: Get the beta driver 3.22. It is described in another thread. It enhanced the performance of my interface a lot...

But isn't that driver designed for the first generation, the second generation is supposed to be better hardware should work best with the correct driver.
John