Thanks for the additional input, all. Dan and Dave, wasn't familiar with freezing tracks until you mentioned it. Not quite that far along in my Sonar knowledge just yet. Will look into that further but given my not exactly 2nd nature recording skills, if I can avoid adding more steps to the process, I would prefer that. Base 57, only problem with the My Book is that it's slower (5400) than my Hitachi internal drive (7200). I hit play and it takes up to 10 seconds for play to commence. Much faster running directly off of my C Drive, which is, I'm told, a no-no. Sanderxpander, I did the google thing and see what you mean. Of course, I have the same problem with Guitar Rig 4, maybe worse. I have listened to some other pieces that have no guitar amp plug-ins but have multiple Dim Pro and Session Drummer tracks - similar, more subtle crackling and popping. Bias and GR just seem to kick those and audio dropouts into high gear all by themselves. Scook, things keep coming around to the internal SSD as a 2nd drive just for Sonar and related programs.
All in all, my wife may have the ultimate solution after watching me chase this and various other 7-year old computer problems down rabbit holes. She asked me why I keep spending money on fixes rather than buy a new computer with exactly what I need on it. What a revelation! My response was that it was better coming from her than me. So, gonna try the track freezing thing and a couple other no-low expense tricks and see how that works but ultimately might just update the big box. In the meantime, I've learned a bunch from you all. I appreciate your perspectives on this my first foray into the forum. Great experience! Thanks and have a great week!