JudasIscariot: One thing I just thought of trying would be to get the games to run on a single core of your processor. Some older games flip out when they encounter multi-core processors since they were made in the days when all processors had a single core ;)
funkmaster5000: Tried to run the game with the start /affinity argument via command promt. Still sluggish. I had to use the command promt, since the game is bitchy when alt-tabbed.
Hmmmm, the only other thing I can think of would be to turn off more non-essential programs that like to run in the background. I know that Chrome running in the background along with suite software (Logitech stuff, phone suite software, that kind of thing) will mess with older games for whatever reasons.
I know you already turned off your MSI program and all that but see what else you can turn off :) Key word: non-essential :)