Windows 7: Mouse & Keyboard unresponsive shortly AFTER bootup

I've seen that this is a somewhat common issue, but mine seems slightly unique. I'm working on a freshly formatted machine and most times when I turn my computer on, the USB mouse and keyboard work momentarily but seem to freeze shortly after windows 7 has started.

The lights on the keyboard and mouse are on, but each device is unresponsive. I've unplugged the mouse and plugged it into different usb ports. Of course once unplugged the lights turn off, but once plugged back in they do not re-light. I don't have another mouse or keyboard to try, so I plugged in my USB memory stick and nothing happens...

From here I have to press and hold the power button and shut down the machine. I can get into Safe Mode and each device works normally. I then reboot and let windows load, from here each device works normally.... The same is true if I awaken my machine from sleep mode. The problem only seems to occur when turning my machine ON after it's been shut down...

I have gone through Device Manager and nothing is flagged. I have also run sfc /scannow with zero violations. I've also gone into my power management options and disabled USB suspend.



Last night I restored my computer to a point prior to Windows 7 Service Pack 1, since I received a BSOD after installing utorrent.... Oddly the BSOD didn't complete. The screen went blue and was hung up. I had to force-down the machine. Once the restore point was restored, I rebooted. Ran dxdiag, sfc /scannow received no errors, restarted and then re-updated to Service Pack 1 and subsequent updates and rebooted to allow windows to re-calibrate windows.

I only mention this because I'm sure someone will suggest restoring.

For a lark I ran realtemp and prime95 to see what would happen for a few hours. No errors, no overheating, nodda. I shut down the machine and then booted 'er up this morning. The mouse and keyboard were working, I had a shower and came back to both unresponsive. Thus the cycle continues...

Does anyone have any suggestions??

Here was some specs:
Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit
i7 920, 12gb RAM, Single 1gb ATI HD5850
Alienware Tactx USB keyboard
Microsoft USB Sidewinder X5 mouse