Ok - an update to this issue. I recently got my hands on a MOTU M4. It does the same thing. So, the computer in question is:
OS: Win 10 Pro
Processor: Intel i7-9700k 8 Core Processor
HDD: 3 total drives - 2 Corsair MP600 Force Series Gen4 500 GB M.202280 NVME SSD and one SSD
RAM: 32 GB of Corsair Vengeance LPX DDR4-3200
I have uninstalled (properly) the M-Track Quad. I have also (in addition to getting new card) have:
* Turned off USB power Management
* (attempted) to update my PC's network adapter driver (no new NIC available)
* Installed latest device drivers
* Turned off USB power management
* Disabled user account control
* Adjusted my processor scheduling to Background Services
* Adjusted my PC's power options for high performance
* Made sure my PC doesn't disable/suspend USB devices
* Turned off 'real time' Windows Defender protection
* Turned off my screen saver (obviously)
* (Tried) to update my PC graphics driver (it is UHD 630 though, which had no updates)
* I also tried removing duplicative VST files. It did not break anything, but did not fix anything either
* Turned off indexing on my primary audio drive (where samples are run from, where Cakewalk saves to)
Yet the problem persists. Any additional things I could/should try? I will try uninstalling and reinstalling all software associated with music production - any particular order I should reinstall them, or does that not make a difference? Only other thing I could try is reinstalling Windows 10 and starting over from scratch. A dramatic option, but one I am not ruling out. Just not sure if that would make any difference though, and would hate doing all that work to end up in the same place I am now.
EDIT: I have also disabled the onboard sound card through BIOS, ensured SpeedStep is disabled and C-States are turned off (which did not remediate the issue).