New Macbook Pro Running Slow. What can I do?

Question

Hey there! I purchased a 15'' Macbook Pro about two months ago. I tried running Starcraft II on it, and it performed great.
Then, while I was playing, it started running -really- well. I had maxed out all the settings, and somehow the framerate was a constant 90-100. Now if I do this I get about 10 frame rate or less, maybe. If I run on even the lowest settings I can't get higher than 65 or so.
I know it's not related to an SMC reset or anything like that. I think there must be some setting on the mac that I'd enabled to cause the game to run so well. It's really a great machine- i7 core processor, 8 gigs of ram, a gig of video memory- and it can barely run this game at all, now. This surprises me because my friend's older macbook, which doesn't even have a graphics card, runs the game better than mine does. I think he's on an i5 or i3 processor, with 256 MBs of video memory on an Nvidia card. I'm on an ATI card.
I've tried reinstalling Lion OSx, I've tried going into Bootcamp, and I've tried all the SMC reset tricks and Disk Repair tricks out there; I've also reinstalled and repaired the game. Another problem is that no drivers seem to work for my graphics card in Windows 7; they all say they're not compatable. Actually, if I run a program called AT Monitor, in OSx, I see that apparently my GPU usage is "0". Does this make sense to anybody?
And then, if I run my video card in Windows 7, for some reason my computer throttles it to 100hz/150hz.
Finally, the charger seems to be running really hot, like really hot. I started noticing the heat in the battery/charger around when the computer started not working well.
I would really appreciate any help! Thanks in advance.

Answer 1

Third-party system modifications are a common cause of instability and poor performance. The following procedure will help identify which such modifications you've installed. Don’t be alarmed by the complexity of these instructions -- they’re easy to carry out and won’t change anything on your Mac.
Launch the Terminal application, copy or drag -- do not type -- the line of text below into the window, and press return:
kextstat -kl | awk ' !/apple/ { print $6 $7 } '
Post the lines of output (if any) that appear below what you just entered (the text, please, not a screenshot.)
Next, do the same thing with this line:
sudo launchctl list | sed 1d | awk ' !/0x|apple|com\.vix|edu\.|org\./ { print $3 } '
That's one line, not two. You'll be prompted for your login password, which won't be displayed when you type it. You may get a one-time warning not to screw up. You don't need to post the warning.
Next, this command:
launchctl list | sed 1d | awk ' !/0x|apple|edu\.|org\./ { print $3 } '
Again, one line. Finally, one more:
ls -1A {,/}Library/{Ad,Compon,Ex,Fram,In,La,Mail/Bu,P*P,Priv,Qu,Scripti,Sta}* 2> /dev/null
Important: If you synchronize with a MobileMe account, your me.com email address will appear in the output of the above command. Change it to something like “[email protected]” before posting.
Remember, this is all drag-and-drop or copy-and-paste, whichever you prefer -- no typing, except your password.
You can then quit Terminal.