I've had good luck with my dell studio xps 9100 for 3 years now.  Maudio profire 2626.  When I start X2a, it loads up and loses my Maudio.  The firewire port is a motherboard-attached port.  I restart my computer, I start the maudio setup screen, it shows the maudio is connected.  I start X2 and setup screen for maudio shows the maudio is no longer connected.  I went ahead and ordered a firewire card in case the port has gone bad.  It will be several days before I get the card though.  I re-installed windows 7, drivers and sonar on my c-drive, it still does the same thing so I'm less likely to think Sonar is the culprit.  My question is... ARE firewire ports on computers prone to going bad? 

yeah the onboard firewire ports are plumbs. the firewire card you ordered, does it have a texas instruments chipset ?? hate to ask the obvious but did you go into, preferences to check your audio devices, are you using asio ??

It could have been a driver update that made it stop working too. I can say had a built in fire wire port on my laptop and it only ever worked briefly and then never again. I tried hard with three different fire wire interfaces .I never solved the problem.

Thanks for the reply.  I'm asio all the way.   I do not know if it is a TI Chipset that I ordered.  I couldn't remember if TI was what  I needed or needed to stay away from.  The brand was SYBA from 3btech.  2 800 mbps and 1 400 port.  I just checked the SYBA website.  It is a TI CHIPSET.
 

Those SYBA cards have TI chipsets so you are cool

so obviously something sonar is doing when it starts is kicking out m audio. what other/or are you running any other hardware in a usb port or anything ?
other soundcards?

I wanted to give everyone who replied or viewed this a  heads up.  I received my new firewire card friday and it fixed all of my problems.  The Maudio has not kicked out once since it was put in.  The onboard firewire port is obviously the problem.  I bought this dell back just before Sonar X1 was released.  I used a USB 2.0 Fast Track Ultra for the longest time and only got the Firewire 2626 about 14 months ago... so the firewire port only lasted 14 months before having problems.  Chregg is correct onboard Firewire are plumbs.  Thanks for everyone's reply and input.

Glad to hear it is working for you now.
 
I went the USB route some time ago, as the Fire Wire compatibility issues scared me away from it, though I think it has a superior transfer rate - at least compared to USB 2.  I do not know if it compares to USB 3.0 as better or not, but I have a functional USB 2 audio interface that I am quite happy with, so it will be a while before I face this issue again.
 
Bob Bone

Chregg
Those SYBA cards have TI chipsets so you are cool

Syba makes a Firewire controller that uses a jMicron chipset... so don't assume that all Syba units a TI.   
Check to be 100% sure...