Game deteriorating

[Puluin]

My computer started doing this about 2 weeks ago after a wonderful "required" windows update. I had to disable search indexing, windows anti virus, AND pause windows updates. Low and behold the game works fine now. Though I can't go digging through my hard drive without having to wait for it to index.
Superfetch might also be a culprit.

I suspect my issue is mostly due to a slowly failing hard drive but I have yet to prove it since I only have issue when anti virus is scanning or Windows update is installing during the joke that is "active hours"

I only throw this out there because everquest seems to be the only program that hangs when these other 3 processes are at work. My other higher end games have zero lag or hangs or freezes