SP35P2 Pro Problems

[Escher]

So I decided on going with the Shuttle for my next system and so far I haven't really been too disappointed. A few things have been kind of weird though, so I was hoping you guys could help out. First, the specs:

Shuttle SP35P2 Pro w/ Q6600 (not currently OC'd - topic for another thread)
G.Skill 4GB (2x2) F2-6400CL5D-4GBPQ
BFG 8800GT OC
WD 750GB HD
Lite-On DVD Burner
Vista Ultimate 64-bit

The first problem I ran into was with the fingerprint reader suddenly crapping out on me. Not that big of a deal since it's a bit gimmicky and uneeded at my house, but rather odd. It would register new fingerprints fine (supposedly), but when attempting to match up a finger swipe to the stored print, it would always fail. It worked fine for about a week before the failures started. I tried removing the software so I could uninstall it and ran into what seems to be a common issue, a missing FP.DLL prevents the uninstall from working! After repeated attempts to uninstall, reboots, disabling, etc, I was finally able to remove the software, reinstall it, and have it work again. But does anyone have any idea what could have happened in the first place?

My second problem, and this is the most annoying, is that my USB keyboard keeps "dying" on me. It would seem random, but sometimes when I come back to using the system after it's been idle for a few hours, the keyboard won't respond and I have to unplug it and plug it back in. Being a Shuttle, this is easy enough to do, but damn annoying! The system is set to never go into "sleep" mode. Is the problem with the keyboard (cheap Dynex, $14.99 @ BB , or is it a system problem?

Are these issues because I'm using Vista64? I loaded it to try it out, but am seriously thinking of dropping back to XP 32 bit as it seems there's not a lot of support for Vista 64 bit right now. Any help you guys can give would be great.

 

[Skott]

I doubt its the keyboard itself. It could be the O/S. It could be the mobo itself too. Is there any other usb ports you can use or do you have just that one? If you have a different usb port try using it and see if you get the same problem.

 

[Escher]

I do have other ports, and just before typing the first post I did change ports to see if that was the cause. Between then and now, the keyboard "died" again. My USB mouse doesn't seem to have the same issues.

One thing I find odd is that in Device Manager, under Keyboard it lists one item:
HID Keyboard Device

But under Human Interface Devices it always adds four items:
HID-compliant consumer control device
HID-compliant device
Office Keyboard
Office Keyboard

No specific drivers came with this keyboard or are available explicitly from the Dynex website that I can see. It's model DX-WKBD.
If I remove all of these from Device Manager, unplug the keyboard and plug it back in, all five entries show back up. Is this normal? Doesn't seem like it to me.