Audio interface randomly stops working

[kerryhall]

I have a system that I use both as a regular desktop and as an audio workstation.

I use the sound card built into my motherboard for all regular day to day audio stuff, ie, youtube, listening to music, etc. This runs through pulseaudio.

I use my class compliant audio interface + reaper for all audio engineering.

I have set the audio settings in reaper to ALSA, input and output device is my interface.

Randomly, maybe twice a week, I will stop getting sound from my system to the interface. lsusb shows the interface is connected when the sound stops working. I can also see the interface in pulseaudio as a possible output device, but selecting it for audio, say for quodlibet sadly does nothing. I can confirm during an outage that the interface still sends audio to my monitors correctly, as if I turn hardware monitoring on and connect, say, a keyboard, I can hear that just fine.

I have tried unplugging and replugging the interface with no luck, until I tried a different USB port, and the audio started working again. (Both USB ports work perfectly fine for all other devices, game pads, bluetooth dongles, card readers, external usb drives, etc)

My questions: How do I prevent this random audio failure from happening? And why does plugging my interface into a *different* USB port fix this issue?

[kerryhall]

Still running into this issue. Any ideas here?

I determined that the same usb port will work if I take the following steps:

* "Boot" the interface by connecting it to a powered hub. Powered hub must be connected to a wall adapter and not the computer!
* Once the interface is "booted", then connect it to the computer.

If this order is not followed, no sound will come out of the interface.

I know this is a Debian problem and not an interface problem because the interface works fine when connected to just the powered hub, no computer. (ie I can get sound output through my monitors)