Mystery graphic card problem?

OK guys my beautiful days with the shiny M17x seems to be fading away! Today Im experiencing a very weird problem with my M17x and I think it comes from my Dual GTX 260M.

First off yesterday was still a beautiful day. I played MW2 at maxed settings, 1920x1200 and 4xAA smoothly like hell at around 90FPS with BatBoy driver (without BatBoy driver the performance was not as good but still smooth like hell). Today I hadnt done any gaming but listening to music, surfing web etc... and everything went just fine.

However things have changed just a few hours ago. First off I logged into MW2 to play but somehow it lagged like hell. Thought I didnt turn on Boost Performance so I checked it but no, Boost Performance was turned on.

I then restarted my computer and notice boot time took about 15 sec longer on my SSD which used to be stupidly fast. The machine then responded a bit slow, not really but quite a bit.
Then I notice my Object Dock lagged like hell when it shows up (I use Auto-hide) I logged in my game but it's unplayable with framerates is around 10!!! I was so confused. Firefox was a bit laggy and nVidia Control Panel was very laggy when I changed menu to menu.

I then changed Hybrid SLI to Save Power then surprisingly everything worked smoothly, Object Dock, FireFox, nVidia Control Panel etc... except MW2 of course.
I then went to BIOS disable Hybrid SLI and Integrated Graphic Card Enabled, everything worked then just fine. So I concluded it was Hybrid SLI problem. But it was a wrong conclusion. I logged into my game to see if problem fixed but NO! MW2 now is not at 10FPS but only around 40-50FPS and not stable. Even worse, after about a minute or two the lag starts kicking in and my FPS drop gradually to 3x then 2x then 1x...

I then thought there was problem with BatBoy driver (sorry, BatBoy) so I uninstalled my current driver and went back to Dell driver on the website. But problem was still there. I then once again went back to BIOS to disable integrated graphic card and everything worked like a charm just like when I set Hybrid SLI to Save Power. So now I got my first conclusion: MY DUAL GTX 260M HAVE PROBLEM!!!

Since right before I tried to play game I installed some Windows Update so I decided to restore my machine to a ghost file which is very clean with all stock drivers. Now without any Windows Update everything seemed to work for a first few minutes then the lag started kicking in (with Boost Performance enabled). When the Object Dock didn't lag then MW2 FPS was around 40-50FPS but kept reducing. When FPS dropped to 10-15FPS, Object Dock lagged as well. Again it only happens when I use my dual cards and doesnt when I use 9400M.

I monitored temps with HWMonitor and saw temps are fine. Everything are around 40-55. My dual cards are at about 40-45 when idle and go up to only 55 after a few minutes playing game. Fans are fine, no weird sound or something. So I have my second conclusion: IT'S NOT BECAUSE OF DRIVERS, WINDOWS UPDATE OR EVEN DIRECTX (I tried reinstall DirectX several times)

And keep in mind that I have never experienced any audio stuttering in Save Power or Stealth Mode (just a little in Boost Performance when I listen to music while surfing web, not in gaming). I also do not have any stuttering in gaming with any game I tried so far (MW, MW2, GTA IV, Crysis, Crysis WH, CoJ BiB...). I also disabled some services as BatBoy guide. And I don't even have audio stuttering now when this problem occurs. The machine seems to work just fine but only has problem when it runs tasks that have graphic stuff involved.

I do also notice that when I change from Save Power to Boost Performance my Windows stuck in grayish Basic Theme for about 2 secs before Aero shows up.

And one more thing that I dont think it has anything to do with this issue but before I encountered the lagging I created some LED lighting theme. Somehow now I got 2 speakers with different colors.

All my drivers are up to date.

I did all the homework I know and I can but its no go I know this is the best place for me to rely on and Im glad being a member here since you guys are the best out there. Can anyone look into my problem and have at least an idea about this weird problem?

My English is bad so maybe it's hard to understand what I'm trying to describe for you. Sorry!

P/S: My last attempt would be doing a clean install, even reformat the whole SSD before installing if needed. But I don't think that will help!

 

Holy wall of text Batman!!!

You should break that apart for an easier read ...

 

^^ Im so upset right now but your reply made me lol.
I edited my post.

 

Silly - just read over your post... thanks for breaking it up. If it was all one paragraph (i didnt see it before) i most likely would've skipped it.

I know this is going to sound noob but, did you happen to hit the nice little Speedometer looking button on the touch strip? Is it possible its running in Stealth Mode?

When you mentioned 'BatBoy's driver' I'm guessing you mean my modded SLI Profile update. I haven't had any issues with MW2 using it so not sure. It also sounds to me that you are using the Command Center's Fusion Module to edit your power profiles. If you disabled the Fusion service then its not going to help. Suggest using the OS's Power Profile interface and making your changes there. Use High Performance and then edit the 'On Battery' option for the High Performance profile. See if that helps.

Also, try closing the AlienFX theme you mentioned, and opening/setting a non-animated theme. Reboot and then see if the behavior you observed earlier is still present.

 

I formatted my SSD then did a clean install but problem was still there with boot time took very long (more than a minute). I went to bed and this morning everything suddenly works smoothly. I dont know why.
By the way, yesterday when I restored my Ghost file it took about 18 minutes to finish. Today it took 3 minutes!!! Does anyone have any idea about what may be the cause for that long restore time?