I just bought 2 Roland Studio Capture 1610s this summer. They won't sync on my laptop without the use of a hub. My desktop has plenty of usb ports and they work fine without the hub but the hub is a necessity on the laptop.

Thanks everyone for your input. I just wanted to hear from those that have done this on laptops and have the experience of what works. I think the trimmed down setup I have planned to use with the laptop should work fine. I am just going to have to leave some things out with the mobile setup, and just keep those on the desktop which has ample usb ports.

Don't be too quick to write off that 3.0 port with an audio interface. I have an interface that was a little squirrely with USB 2.0. I plugged into into the USB 3.0 port to see what would happen, and the performance improved dramatically.

To add to all the hubbub, I say, get a hub, bub!
 
I have 4 ports on my laptop, 3 USB-3 & 1 USB-2. I use a 10 port powered hub with 5 items plugged into it and a 2-way switch so 2 computers can use the perifs, though only one at a time. Works great for me.
 
Steve

as stated, get a powered hub- you won't regret it. next, experiment with different configurations until you find a winner. my hunch is that as long as you keep the interface by itself ( on it's own port), everything will work smoothly either way.

Anderton
Don't be too quick to write off that 3.0 port with an audio interface. I have an interface that was a little squirrely with USB 2.0. I plugged into into the USB 3.0 port to see what would happen, and the performance improved dramatically.

USB-3 ports that are problematic are typically 3rd-party add-on controllers (not Intel USB-3 that's integrated into Z77/Z87 motherboards).  Similar to using a non-TI chipset Firewire controller...

I too am a big fan of powered hubs.
 
Just to clarify something, USB 3 ports will NOT transfer data from a USB 2.0 device any faster than USB 2.0 speeds.  (not to mention that there is no guarantee that an audio interface will even function properly in a USB 3.0 port, although I am happy that the above poster did have success with that).
 
Bob Bone
 

Thanks again everyone for sharing your experience and thoughts on what has worked well for you. I have zero experience with a usb 3 port and the Tascam US 1800 that I bought seems rather finicky as well. Hard to tell though because I went rather quickly with the Windows 8 upgrade, upgrade to X2, then the US 1800. To be quite honest the dust is still settling. Now I want to get this Laptop (a core I3 Toshiba) working so when I want to go to friends places the desk can stay home. So thanks for all the replies on what's working in the real world.
I also want to thank the forum heavyweights (you know who you are) for the sage advice.

Get a hub.  Plug your audio into it's own port.  Everything else will work fine on a hub.  Works like a charm for me.  No laptop on the market has enough USB ports.  It's likely you won't even need a powered hub but it won't hurt.

Give the interface it's own port.
 
Let everything else share the hub. Mouse, printer, etc.