I've been having some frustrating problems with my computer lately, and I wanted to see if anyone had some advice. My system is an Alienware M15x, less than a year old. It's not the highest end by any means, but it should run LotRO better than my old Inspiron. Unfortunately, it doesn't.

I've seen the performance range anywhere from half-way decent to downright unplayable. I've put up with it for quite a while (although always on the lookout for a tip that might help it). However, last week it dipped into the unplayable range 2 out of the 3 nights I raided. In the Gortheron fight on Sunday, I experienced a whole new meaning for the term "lag" as I literally lagged behind reality to the point where the Gortheron, on my screen, still had well over 200k health when he was dead for everyone else. It wasn't until the chest was looted and everyone else left that I finally got to the end of the fight. It was horrible.

Apart from that bizarre incident, I've had some other problems:

1) Very slow loading screens with LotRO "Not Responding" at several points along the way. This was not a problem when I first got my computer, but has been getting worse over time.
2) Videos hitch and will crash LotRO unless I Esc out of them, including the "Turbine" screen when LotRO is started. I used to be able to watch them...but not for the past few months.
3) VERY LOW fps. I had a fairly steady 6.5 fps standing on Haldir's flet. Changing video settings doesn't effect this. I tried installing the Standard Res client out of frustration, which got me up to 9.5 fps. Oddly, while riding a goat through Moria, it was up to about 13 fps. I did some quests and a couple instances where I got about 15 fps. I used to get much higher (over 60), and actually I'm not sure when this really got bad.
4) Hitchy graphics. Even with low fps, movement shouldn't be nearly as rough as they are. The fps meter may say I'm getting 10 or 15 or whatever, but it never looks like I'm seeing more than 3 or 4 frames per second. This has been a problem since day one. My old computer runs very nice, smooth animations.
5) General sluggishness. It takes a half a second for my character to move or turn or stop or use a skill. When I type in the chat window, it's behind my typing 3 or 4 characters. It seems different than the hitchy-ness where it lags behind but catches up...it seems like it's always behind. I'm not sure how long this has been a problem since I got used to it after a while. It wasn't until I was playing on my old computer for a bit and came back that I realized how bad it was.

Part of the reason I bring up the last 2 is because it doesn't happen on my old laptop. The animations are smooth and the controls are responsive, even if the fps isn't much better. I can't run anything better than low graphics on DX9 on that computer. Sadly, even if I drop the Alienware down to this quality of graphics, the animations are just as choppy as on high settings.

In trying to figure this all out, I've uninstalled just about every program I could. Turned off or uninstalled AV, firewalls, Spybot, etc. (and reinstalled/reactivated them once I determined they weren't the cause of the problem, lol.) I've updated every driver. I've run diagnostics. I even burned out a video card trying to update my BIOS. I've reinstalled LotRO. I've messed around with every graphics setting. I've tried switching between DX9, 10, and 11.

The only thing that has made any difference was setting up port forwarding, which so far has sped up my loading screens and seems to have fixed my ability to view videos. Nothing has helped the low fps, choppy graphics, or sluggishness though.

I'm really at my wit's end here. Anyone know what else I can try to get to the bottom of this?