azslow3
EDIT: I was typing too slow (as usual, see my nick)
 

kennywtelejazz
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 ... 

That should be fine till you see your processor consumption is hi (too many synths, effects and so on).

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 ...

This one works with whatever you attached to it, at least from compatibility point of view.
 

using the beta driver in  ASIO the latency is still higher that what I find acceptable or useable 

May be it is better to specify concrete numbers you get, different people have different "acceptance".
 

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?
...
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...

Already suggested switching off all power saving featured (in BIOS and OS, including dynamic CPU frequency) is very good idea (you can try to switch in back one by one once everything is working fine).
 
Try to avoid USB hub between the interface and the computer. While USB is designed with predictable latency/throughput in mind, real implementations (in comp., in the interface and in the hub) are usually bad.
 
USB devices have longer "route" when your computer comes back after sleep. It is better to stop SONAR and wait a bit till ASIO is also unloaded before pushing the sleep button. In all cases, reconnecting 2i4 should return it to the working state (again, with ASIO unloaded first). Otherwise you can try to play with "USB power during sleep" settings (if your laptop has some).
 

 …I loop the section I want to comp over and after 5 loops my Audio engine in X3 dies on me and everything stops is 6 gigs of ram just too light ? could it be something else ? my buffers were set to 512 / ASIO.

512 is in fact conservative. Even for very bad system. But...
After a while when you do not touch keyboard/mouse, Windows think you are not working. It can start power saving and/or service tasks. It is normally good to switch network during sessions and periodically leave Windows running with network connected. Fighting and killing all background activity is hard.
Also check with "HD Tune" (free version is ok) that your disk has no significant "drops" in performance.
 

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 ….

Running with explorer opens SONAR with user privileges. Many plug-ins detect that and ask for registration. Running once under Admin and once under User normally solves that problem (till your system get significant Windows update... like Windows 8.1).

hello azslow3 , I'm gonna do my best here …
 
I haven't mastered the art of multi quoting …I'm pretty much gonna try to work my way down the list .
 
I sat it out since SONAR 6 ..admittedly thats a pretty long time …
my whole musical focus has always been I'm a guitar player first. Every time I started saving up for a new computer I wound up buying a new guitar or amp instead 
 
i feel this lap top is OK enough to give me a chance to catch up to the latest version of SONAR ..
 
I'm not looking to slam the 2i4 at all …it sounds very decent for a low end usb card
with the added out puts it might turn out to be an extremely versatile little card after all 
most of the issues i was having were hardware settings on the lap top that needed to be changed ...
 
regarding the ASIO buffer size and latency issues I was experiencing …..
when I started this thread , they were set at 512 …round trip added up to 48 or something ms
 
after following as many suggestions as i could up to this point
I have the ASIO buffers set to 128 …this happens to be a marked improvement …
currently the lap top is put away so I can't give you the exact round trip numbers ….might be around 12 ms ?
 
as far as what i consider acceptable ….
my timing is very important to me it and it is something that I have spent many years of my playing working on  …..
even a round trip latency of 10 ms can be somewhat of a distraction  ...
the current latency is certainly usable ….it's not like I dropped 10 grand on this rig ….I got what I paid for 
 
when time permits i will look into a few of the other things you have suggested 
 
thank you very much for sharing your points of view to help me out . I certainly appreciate it 
 
Kenny
 
 

Sound travels 1 foot per millisecond. Just pretend you're on stage, and the amp is 10 feet behind you

Anderton
Sound travels 1 foot per millisecond. Just pretend you're on stage, and the amp is 10 feet behind you

that happens to be a very good way of looking at it  all it would involve is a simple change of perception on my part 

Kenny, thanks for the response. I have been playing guitar for 50 years and piano for 56 years this year. Guitar was self taught. The piano was classical training by a tutor. I started working for Capricorn Records in the late 60s, early 70s as a session player. Although Macon has the rep as the cradle of Southern Rock, I learned my chops from Clapton, Beck, Page, etc. My first influence was Herb Ellis when I was a child. I use to watch him on the Merv Griffin Show. BOY! I am old.
My point is I have been fortunate to work in blues, rock, gospel, jazz (which is my first love),country and classical. Sonar and the vst instruments I have chosen have delivered every time for me, no matter what genre I have to work in. It has been a long road learning computer recording when you have grown up in the tape world.
I started computer recording seriously in 1998. Now I have some pretty well known producers that call me from time to time to pick MY brain about bugs in their systems and how to do this or that. It makes me really happy to know that I came this far when I remember being afraid to touch the keyboard.
I just wanted to acknowledge the post and congratulate you on working with Andrea. What a set of pipes that guy has. And such a great and humble artist. Play On, my friend!

Kenny, a quick follow up. Here is a video on unparking cores done on a Win8 machine. He does a nice check in the beginning to let you see if parking it enabled or not - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xrvDVZg6C58
 
As far as bloatware (since you bought this off-the-shelf), much can be disabled simply using "msconfig.exe" The "Startup" tab in that program lists things that are set to run on system startup. If not enabled you can still run them manually if needed, but they will not automatically load on boot. Be sure to research what is in that list before disabling (unchecking) things, as some processes may go to system utilities (touch pad, etc.) If in doubt, can post a screen cap of what is listed, or ask in the forum.

Hey guys ,
I'm still with you on following the sugestions that some of you have been put forth in this thread ... 
i would still like to get back to each and every one of you …if I haven't yet ..I'm not snubbing you ...
the past few days have involved me dealing with a few time sensitive non musical chores I just can't put off ..
vet visits / shots for the dog ……car repairs / regs…..emissions…
i've been chipping away taking care of what needs to be done in those areas …. 
my apologies if you offered me an answer / solution and I haven't acknowledged your contrubition yet ... 
leaving folks hanging in the breeze is not my style at all …I'm hoping to get back on track later this eve or tomorrow 
 
thank you for your patience , 
Kenny

Brando
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
 

hello Brando 
i used the app from your link ..thanks for that..
here's what the app shows …

 
 

 

 
if anybody notices any red flags please let me know 
 
thank you 
 
Kenny

sock monkey
There is this thread in the Hardware forum
http://forum.cakewalk.com/Need-help-again-interface-issue-m3081757.aspx
 
I would get the word from Focusrite support about the USB 3.0 ports. I'm pretty sure I read somewhere not to use them with Scarletts,  but it doesn't make sense to me as the 2i4 is buss powered and USB 3.0 is a more powerful output for this reason. 
 
I hate to say it but I have read a lot of threads with people having these issues with the 2i2 and 2i4. I think buss power is a bad idea. It's one reason I went with the 6i6 as it uses a wall wart. 
 
And defiantly check that laptop out with a DPCLAT utility... that is #1 with laptops. Some laptops are just plain un usable because of the bios settings you can't even change. 

Hello sock monkey, 
I gave that a read when you first posted it ..thanks for the link ..
the 2i4 is growing on me now that some of my issues are being addressed ….
I'm running it in the usb 2 port no hub...
well now that I know , my next usb inter face will probaly be wall powered ..this is how I learn 
 
thank you 
 
Kenny

I'm lost now  i've been trying to read a few posts to see who I left hanging ...
let me do something I can do …a few posters here have mentioned core parking ...
that's a new phrase to me ….oh boy you guys sure got me jumping through hoops ...
here's a couple of screen shots 
 

 

 

 
any red flags please let me know ….I'm thinking of disabling apple push ,
I don't have any devices that need syncing ..
 
Thanks guys, 
 
Kenny

Hi Kenny,
 
   The screen shot you have of the CPUs doesn't look like core parking is enabled (which is preferred). If enabled, the graphs on the right will have CPUs reading things like "CPU 1 - Parked" if enabled.
 
   The Apple Push would be one that could be disabled, as synching tasks can begin to function at the worse moments, and if you do not use it, disabling it will prevent this.
 
   Bottom line: It seems like you have gotten things so they are functioning more smoothly so "if it isn't broke, don't fix it" applies. If you are tracking and suddenly things seems odd, another check you can do is open the resource monitor as in the first screenshot and click on the "CPU" column to order it in descending order (inverted triangle) to list the processes in descending CPU usage order. If some process is suddenly spiking that conflicts with what you are doing; it would be one to research to either lower its priority, or disable it altogether.