NYSR
I checked out the FireWire chipsets.

It took me a while to nail them down. In an add on card is a StarTech 1394 OHCI Compliant Host Controller with chipset TSB12LV21 which is specifically stated by Presonus as NOT compatible. On the motherboard is a VIA 1394 with chipset VT 6315 which is listed by presonus as compatible and this is the port it is plugged into.

I did the registry tweak to inhibit core parking.

Driver settings in SONAR indicate that my Presonus StudioLive 1602 (sometimes 1642) is using ASIO at a bit depth of 24 and a sample rate of 44.1

ASIO reported latencies are 6.3 ms input, 8.1 ms output, and a total round trip of 14.4 ms (634 samples). Dropouts occur only occasionally during playback or while recording.

Let's see if the core parking helped.

Thanks - what is you audio interface ASIO Buffer Size set to?  To have the 14+ millisecond total roundtrip latency reported in Sonar, for a 24-bit 44.1 k setup, this value is like a bit larger than it needs to be.
 
On my system, I have ASIO Buffer Size set to 128, and a Sample Rate of 48 k.  It processes at 24-bit.  In Sonar, the Sample Rate matches the 48 k, and I record at 24-bits.  I have input and output latency values in Sonar of 4.7 ms and a total roundtrip latency of 9.3 milliesconds.  The input /output number of samples are each 224, and the total roundtrip number of samples is 448.
 
I think if your ASIO Buffer Size can come down to 128, that you would likely get your latency to around the same values as I run with, and this would likely get rid of those dropouts.
 
Some interface software control panels use sliders to adjust the buffer size, and call it something other than ASIO Buffer Size - like Number of Samples, or sometimes simply a number.  Whatever the name of it, or the mechanism, you want to get that total roundtrip latency value down to or just under 10 milliseconds, which is a pretty good balance between everything.
 
I think you are pretty close.
 
Bob Bone
 

I deeply appreciate the help here, it has been wonderful. Tests this morning after changing the core parking so far I have had zero dropouts. I will keep this setting in reserve and continue to tweak the ASIO settings. I do have a marvel controller which was problematic and noted to be an issue I had to change to the other controller. However Marvel did finally release an update that solved the problem and I am able yo use it now. I have room on the motherboard for up to 10 SATA drives. My corsair solid state drives are awesome especially at boot time. As soon as the boot process hands things over to windows I am up and running stable in seconds.

So I will spend some time tweaking and probably give it a week of stress testing. Thank you again. There is much useful information for me to work through.

So, what is your current ASIO Buffer Size, and what is your current Total Roundtrip Latency?
 
Bob Bone
 

Awesome! Now you can get back to making music. :-)

OK, several days into this, it appears that the core parking was the big culprit. I can have ZERO droupouts even with the anti virus running now. So if I forget to disable it until reboot, I can still fly.
 
Thanks again.

NYSR, glad it's all working!
 
On a side note, I highly recommend (from personal experience) keeping your new computer off the internet unless it's for software updates, VI downloads, etc. Even with anti virus, you are inevitably going to run into problems...there is so much malicious garbage out there just waiting to get into your system and create havoc; no PC is 100% immune...unless you keep it offline. If you have another system laying around, use that one foraccessing the internet. The last thing you need is a Trojan or something right in the middle of a serious project. 

That is what concerns me with cloud computing. I need to be online for some of my programs to operate. So I limit internet access and run those programs only when I need to access the cloud.

And what happens to our data when terrorists blow up multiple redundant server farms concurrently after we've all bought into the fad? Potentially a huge problem if big businesses made the switch and something awful happened, a digital 9/11 ... I am not a fan of single point of failure solutions.

eric_peterson
And what happens to our data when terrorists blow up multiple redundant server farms concurrently after we've all bought into the fad? Potentially a huge problem if big businesses made the switch and something awful happened, a digital 9/11 ... I am not a fan of single point of failure solutions.

Right... or when terrorists detonate an EMP bomb over our major cities.
 
As a society, we're putting way to much trust in digital technology.

Let's not forget a nice big, fat, sun mass coronal ejection, like twas what knocked Quebec's grid completely out of commission a few years back.
 
(Personally, I think they had it coming - kidding)
 
Bob Bone