Nvidia GT 630M Underperforming

[diamond225]

Noob here,

PC Specs:
Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit
Intel i7-2670QM @ 2.20 GHz
8GB DDR3 RAM
Nvidia GT 630M

Any help will be hugely appreciated!
When playing Minecraft (or any other games) they lag more than they did two days ago.
Normally I would get ~70 fps when running high on everything on Minecraft.
Two days ago it went down to 15 fps. It was running fine in the morning of that day!
I have reinstalled Windows, changed preferred graphics processor in Nvidia settings and updated to latest drivers on both Nvidia and Intel. I have also updated Java to the current latest version: JRE 7u10.
Done a full scan using Malwarebytes and Norton.
I am really hoping this isn't an hardware issue!

Again, any help is appreciated! Thank you.

 

[darth pravus]

Changed power setting in windows?

 

[Sunius]

Check temperatures. You can do that using HWMonitor.

http://www.cpuid.com/softwares/hwmonitor.html

Make to check them during the lag, not while idling on desktop.

 

[diamond225]

Changed power setting in windows?

I am using the performance power setting that came with my laptop(HP)

 

[pauls3743]

It's not a problem with your computer. Unfortunately, it's actually the way the game try to animate things. Let's say you get a super pickaxe and mine, mine, mine but your inventory is full. What happens is that the remaining blocks float around in mid-air roughly where they have been mined. As this grows, the load on your computer grows as well because it's got to animate all of these spinning blocks to the point you really notice it because the game lags rotten. The rain can also cause this effect.

 

[diamond225]

It's not a problem with your computer. Unfortunately, it's actually the way the game try to animate things. Let's say you get a super pickaxe and mine, mine, mine but your inventory is full. What happens is that the remaining blocks float around in mid-air roughly where they have been mined. As this grows, the load on your computer grows as well because it's got to animate all of these spinning blocks to the point you really notice it because the game lags rotten. The rain can also cause this effect.

This is a completely new world for testing on and lag also appears on other games.

 

[diamond225]

Check temperatures. You can do that using HWMonitor.

http://www.cpuid.com/softwares/hwmonitor.html

Make to check them during the lag, not while idling on desktop.

Thank you for the suggestion.
All the CPU cores are at a lower than normal temperature.
During the lag, max CPU temperature for all 4 cores is 53 degrees Celsius. Before, the CPU normally reaches 80 degrees Celsius when playing Minecraft and other games.

Hard drive maintains a steady 33 degrees Celsius.
GPU was not shown on CPUID HW monitor so I had to use GPU-Z;
GPU reaches 60 degrees Celsius maximum.

 

[Sunius]

What is GPU usage during lag?

 

[diamond225]

What is GPU usage during lag?

Sorry for the late reply,
GPU: 60%

 

[diamond225]

Just an idea, I was moving some movies from my FTP server to my phone. I was also playing minecraft as the movies were moving. At first I thought the lag was a result of the movies, but the transfer had finished. And the lag remained.

 

[Sunius]

And what is your CPU usage during lag?

 

[diamond225]

This was extremely weird. I got it fixed!
The way I did it:
Unplugged all USB devices from my laptop,
Restart the computer.
FPS is back up to 70fps.
Thanks to everyone who helped, especially Sunius.
I will keep monitoring my system for the next few weeks.
For anyone else who have this problem, also try checking your temperatures as mentioned by Sunius.
I also have a theory, maybe an external hard drive reduces system performance??
I had an external hard drive plugged in to my computer during the lag.

 

[diamond225]

Best answer selected by diamond225.

 

[Sunius]

Well, it could be that your anti virus was scanning the external hard drive. That would explain it all.