M-Audio Delta 1010lt works great for a time, then stops working

[binascii]

I have done quite a bit of research and experimentation on this issue with no success, so I'm hoping someone out there has had the same issue and solved it.

I have been running my Delta 1010lt fo many years now on several incarnations of my home studio system, and it has been a corner stone of my audio system. I currently have my studio (AVLinux) and my daily driver (Debian) on parrallel HDD's on the same machine... the same hardware I have been using for quite a few years now. The problem is everything works great for a few weeks or even months then all of a sudden my Delta card dissapears from the hardware list on both OS's. I have actually observed this happening as the sound starts to distort then gets worse and after about 10 seconds stops working all together. After that it is gone, it doesn't appear with lshw and the only way to get it back is to physically swap the card to another PCI slot. Force restarting ALSA does not help. Then a few weeks/months later, same issue. I have my onboard audio disabled in the BIOS and use the Delta card on both systems. On the main pc I am just using pulse and Mudita24. In AVL I don't have pulse installed at all, but the issue affects both systems.

The steps I have tried to resolve this are too numerous to list here really, so I will provide further info as requested... but the key points are one; This issue has been consistent across multiple distros as my daily driver has changed from Ubuntu to Arch and finally Debian, and two; It actually works perfectly for weeks or months at a time even though I use this system all day every day for work. This issue doesn't actually stop me working, which is why it"s been ongoing for so long... but it's a pain, so I'm hoping there's a solution out there. Cheers, D

[folderol]

This looks like a bad joint or fractured track on the card, and every time you move it, the flexing temporarily remakes the contact, until it has had time to oxidise.

Have a good look over the card (both sides) with the highest power magnifier you can get.

[binascii]

Thanks folderol... you did inspire me to go over the card again, this time with a digital microscope. Theres no sign of oxidisation or cracked joints/tracks on the board. I did notice some oxidisation and dirt build up on the PCI pins though, which I have carefully cleaned. Thing is I won't know if that was causing an issue or not for a while, it's one of those intermittent problems. Thanks for the valid response, I'll update either way.