Sudden Drop in Quality and Stuttering/Lag in all Games

[HBob-omb8]

I built my computer back in March 2014 and have had no problems up until now. Although my computer seems to be running smoothly, whenever I try to play any game it has a sort of stutter-y lag and the textures appear to be lower in quality than they did before. Just a week ago I was running Far Cry 4 almost maxed out and now I can barely even play Dota 2.

One thing that I should mention is that recently I have had frequent power cuts (10-15 in the last week) causing the computer to shut down improperly. Could these power cuts have damaged my components, or is there another problem?

Any help would be much appreciated- I really want to play games!😀

Here are my specs: http://uk.pcpartpicker.com/p/XKqCdC

Thanks

 

[benftf]

Surges definitely could have shot your GPU. If everything else is running smoothly except your games, that's probably the case. See if you can borrow a friends or buy a cheap one to test and return it when you're done (somewhere with a physical location like best buy or comp usa).

 

[HBob-omb8]

Surges definitely could have shot your GPU. If everything else is running smoothly except your games, that's probably the case. See if you can borrow a friends or buy a cheap one to test and return it when you're done (somewhere with a physical location like best buy or comp usa).

Thanks for the reply. Is there a way I can test the GPU without having to remove it?