Hello ,
I suppose this post has been a long time coming . as a last resort I might as well see if it's pilot error or my rig .
 
a little quick history 
Last year I picked up a brand new  lap top , Win 8 64bit OS ( lower middle of the road spec $500 range )  
Yeah , I know C….be grateful you don't have to go there ever again …but I do  it's the best I can do for now ... 
For a sound card I went with a Focusrite 2i4 since a few folks here recommended it and it fell into a price range I could swing ...
in addition to that I wound up upgrading to X3 pro , then i bought a whole bunch of software and synths from various reputable companies.
I was basically looking to play catch up on things … in addition to that I picked up a lot of the plugs and various things Cakewalk had on sale ..
 
in theory and on paper everything looks good …
I said to myself OK…i have a clean slate here , your pretty much caught up now , lets start peeling away at the leaning curve ...
now , if this was a story in a fairy tale I suppose I would expect a happy ending ….the truth is, this whole experience has been a nightmare for me …
I'm honestly at the point where I want to take this Rig to the range and put a few clips of 45 ACP down range and just be done w this ...
the only reason why I don't do that is I feel it would be a permanent solution to what I hope is only a temporary problem .
It is very possible that this old dog just don't know what he is doing and he might need to learn a few new tricks .
 
before I get into some of the problems I've been having , i need to state my intention and state clearly what I might be able to reasonably expect for posting this thread ….I'm not a troll , I'm certainly not looking to argue of fight w anybody here...
I'm just looking to find answers to a couple of things .
I would like to know if I'm having a typical experience w this type of rig …. am I just doing something wrong , or expecting just too much…out of my rig ….or even myself at this point ..
 
right out of the gate I didn't care for the latency of the 2i4 and in the begining I wasn't aware of the problems I was about to have  since I was more focused on trying to learn my way around SONAR by doing little bite sized tutorials on my own 
once I started swinging into gear . it turns out that I was having problems and I did contact Focusrtie ...
after a long back and forth it was sugested that I use the most recent Beta driver..well  ok ….they told me to do that ..i did that and I'm still not totally loving it ...
using the beta driver in  ASIO the latency is still higher that what I find acceptable or useable 
 
in addition to that I have a couple of questions here for the lap top guys,
is it typical for a usb sound card to stop working all together and require a computer restart once you close the lid on your laptop? 
every time I closed the lid and put my lap top to sleep I would have to restart my computer just to gain access to my 2i4 ...
it would show up as my default audio device in the windows task bar …but the sound was garbled unless I did a restart 
I have also noticed that if the cable from the usb port got moved slightly in a gentle fashion w out any signifacant pressure on the hub the sound card would also require a restart of the computer...
 
Now I'm not sure if this is a sound card issue or if it releated to another all together completely different issue
some of my friendly songs forum members have suggested to me that I should try utilizing and learning the comping feature  ..
 
so what i did was I set up a premixed instrumental track as an experement to blow over using comping ...
I set my guitar track to record in comping mode and after giving it one or two quick multiple shots ….I said hey this is cool
now I set up to do an actual group of takes in one shot …I loop the section I want to comp over and after 5 loops my Audio engine in X3 dies on me and everything stops ….
does anybody here know what the possible cause of that would be ? 
I was running direct ..no plug s on my track …just straight guitar recording in mono …playing over one stereo backing track ...
is 6 gigs of ram just too light ? could it be something else ? my buffers were set to 512 / ASIO.
 
I'm not joking around I really do want your help …
Today I met the straw that has became my last straw ...two things happened , the first thing may be totally a Windows 8 thing….
 
I had a mix that I had done in SONAR 6 that I had put on the laptop to experiment around in X3 and one of my non Cake Audio editing programs ….
normally I do the whole run as administrator for the app and open what I want to work on once the program opens ..
today I saw the rendered mix in the explorer list and decided to double tap the file to open it up ...
the next thing that happened really pissed me off ….
the non Cakewalk application actually pulled me over and decided to do a license and registration check I kid you not ...
the music app told me that my demo had expired and I'm like what ? I shut it down dragged my lap top over to where my modem was , plugged in the cable and restarted the app …this time it asked me if I wanted to register my software on line
….my serial numbers and my registration was there so I hit yes…. what the heck man …this app has been licensed and registered to me for 6 months ….now I'm left asking myself a couple of questions ...
Is this a Windows 8 thing ?
do I have to constantly have to put my machine on the net just to use a software application I bought and payed for ?…..
the last time this machine was on the net was a few months ago , this was the first time I ever tried to open a file from the explorer view w this music app ..very unsettling is an deffintly understatement ...  
 
last but certainly not least ...
I honestly can not trust what I'm hearing with this rig ….at all 
My older SONAR setup / DAW has a M Audio 1010lt card and occasionally I put a Audiophile 192 in there also ...
now granted consumer level cards ? yes , maybe …Yet the fact of the matter is I do trust what I hear ...
I have always been able to guarantee consistant results while using this rig , even if those results sound constantly bad ..they are consistent 
 
I opened up a X3 session today that I spent may hours working on . when I had recorded this session I had plugged in my 2i4 directly into my studio monitors all during my tracking and mixing…now I'm starting to think it is possible that this is where my mistake was …
on my desktop rig I run my sound card outs into a mixer and then I run the mixer to my monitors … in that set up I have my sound card set to 0 db and I do trust my gain staging all across the board ...
when I opened up my X3 mix earlier today I was surprised at how horrible my mix sounded when I ran my Rig into a set of desktop JBLS
my gain staging was all over the map and what I thought was a decent EQ on each track sounded like a$$ …. 
now I'm certainly not blaming anyone or SONAR for this ..the burden of that certainly falls on me ...
 
did I happen to do the wrong thing by not running the 2i4 into the mixer first ? and then adjust my levels from there ...
 
this is pretty much the gist of some of the problems I have been experiencing 
 
I honestly don't feel I can start a project from scratch and expect predictable results …with the lap top rig / 2i4 
what am I doing wrong here folks ? I'm sure some of you guys got the answers 
up until this point I have been starting and doing all musical projects in software and hardware environments that I trust 
this has involved a lot of extra work on my end for the simple reason that I end up up having to import OMF files into X3 or start something in 6 and then open it up in X3 once I'm in the ball park ...
this approach sure seems like a lot of extra work for no reason 
 
anyway thank you for listening and I do hope I can sort this out with your help 
 
Kenny
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

are you plugging a usb2 interface into a usb3 port perhaps? that can cause issues
good luck!

LOL...I don't think anyone would accuse you of being a troll Kenny. 6Gb of ram should be plenty. I have 4 and don't have any issues. I don't know anything about USB sound cards. I run a Delta 1010. As far as latency, have you tried abjusting the latency offset in preferences? I don't care for windows 8 personally. Maybe I'm just resistant to change, but I switched back to 7. I've also not tried using X3 on a laptop, but I have heard that people have had issues with stock 5400rpm hard drives. Admittedly, I can't answer a lot of your questions, but I can say that X3 has been pretty stable for me. I hope you get it sorted out.

lawp
are you plugging a usb2 interface into a usb3 port perhaps? that can cause issues
good luck!

hi  lawp ,
my lap top only has one usb 2 port and one usb 3 port ...my eyesight is pretty good except for reading so yes, I'm sure I've probably made that mistake a few times in the past . 
what I have been doing is running a usb powered extension hub to connect my usb 2 stuff ...
I'm not sure if that plays into it or not…if I can give up using a mouse and learn the smart gestures maybe I can ditch the hub.
thank you
Kenny 

Have you checked your dpc latency? Laptops have a lot of power saving features that need to be shut off. Sounds like  among these, your usb ports are suspending/sleeping.

This may help a little:  http://www.sweetwater.com/sweetcare/articles/pc-optimization-guide-for-windows-8/
 
I am in IT and dislike Win8. Most businesses will not upgrade because of the lost productivity learning Win8 causes. My Dell business rep has sold a whopping 3 laptops with Win8 since it's introduction.
 

I'm running X3 on a Toshiba laptop, Windows 8, with 16 gigs of RAM, with a ton of plugs and vst instruments. It also has a secondary drive. I have to mention that both drives are 5400s.  When I record and mix everythings in the box. This is my mobile recording rig. When performing live I use an old Focusrite Saffire USB just for outs to the house. Of course, just playing projects I can juice up the buffer pretty high so no problems there. If I am recording live in a group situation, sometimes as many as 24 tracks live at once,( I do quite a bit of gospel choir recording), I use 2 Roland Studio-Capture 1610s synced together for 32 ins and 20 outs. I can usually with smaller projects get around the 128 sample area. The larger projects usually hover around the 256 mark. If I use the Saffire for recording, the buffer usually starts around 128 and gets bumped up to 256.  If it's turning into a sizeable production, 512 is the norm. Needless to say, the Studio-Captures are usually the ticket for recording.
I have an older Asus quad desktop that had been my main workstation for a few years. The desktop has virtually replaced it. I did some of the suggested tweaks for better audio performance in Windows 7 on the Asus. The first day or two the computer acted kind of strange. As if it was getting used to the new setup. After the first day, it was blazing away like a Ferrari! It still is not the computer the Toshiba is but tweaking it DID help. I have seen so many posts that say it's not necessary to tweak a computer anymore after the advent of Windows 7 and 8. I can attest to the fact that, IN MY CASE, it absolutely made a difference.
 Again, I have been very lucky with my computer choices. I have always bought off the shelf computers and cleaned out all the bloatware and such. By the time I got done cleaning and tweaking, I have ended up with some very reliable rigs. It can be done.
Now the troubles I have faced has always been due to a plugin that just is not happy working with X3. I don't use anything with a dongle! I guess I have Big Brother Syndrome. I test all the plugs until I find the culprit. When the plug is found I eliminate it completely. Usually I have something else I can use and if not I will find a newer or better plug, give it a trial run and if all is good I get it.
I feel your pain. I am not here looking down my nose saying you should have bought that 18 core Intel with 5,256 gigs of RAM. When I first started out in computer recording I started with out with a custom built machine that was supposed to be Abbey Road in a box! It was soon replaced by an off the shelf HP full of bloatware and minimum memory. Don't get me wrong!! There a lot of great builders out there and some right here on this forum. Maybe you could try contacting them. Jim Roseberry comes to mind.                                                                              I have recorded on systems that you could launch a rocket to Mars on and I have recorded on rigs that were no better than a word processor. If you spend the time to tweak a little and find and stick with the plugins you know work well for you, you can work comfortably and reliably.
I know this got long winded here but I thought maybe sharing my experiences could help. I wish you luck and I wish I had THE answer for you. Unfortunately, the bottom line is to find out the settings for your rig that run best for you. I can attest to the fact that no two machines run the same. Even if it is the same make and model! 

Leadfoot
LOL...I don't think anyone would accuse you of being a troll Kenny. 6Gb of ram should be plenty. I have 4 and don't have any issues. I don't know anything about USB sound cards. I run a Delta 1010. As far as latency, have you tried abjusting the latency offset in preferences? I don't care for windows 8 personally. Maybe I'm just resistant to change, but I switched back to 7. I've also not tried using X3 on a laptop, but I have heard that people have had issues with stock 5400rpm hard drives. Admittedly, I can't answer a lot of your questions, but I can say that X3 has been pretty stable for me. I hope you get it sorted out.

Hello Leadfoot , 
you make a lot of good points and I'm with you on most of them...
Yes, X3 seems very good , I guess I'm just having a lot of peripheral side issues to deal with . 
this is my first experience using a usb powered sound card in a Windows environment …honestly it blows  ….
I much prefer PCI sound cards 
I just might have to go out and try to find a used desk top w W 7 and put my 192 to work ...
 
On paper ,  the processing power of the Win 8 OS seems powerful enough . I just don't feel like I'm bonding with it at all ...
I sure wish it would learn to mind it's manners …..no matter what I do , this OS is the poster child for constant nagware …
if I could afford a good lawyer I would sue this OS for it's constant harassment  
 
thanks 
 
Kenny
 

I think it is generally not recommended to run your audio interfaces through a hub. You may get slightly better results connecting directly. That said, it doesn't seem like this audio interface is the one for you. Do you have access to another one you could borrow to see if you have better luck?

BTW - Kenny - if you haven't yet measured your DPC latency - I recommend Latency Mon for Windows 8 rather than Thesycon's dpc latency checker - 
 
http://www.resplendence.com/download/LatencyMon.exe