Problem Fixed
After experimenting with my graphics card settings I found the problem. Here's the info for anyone else who ever has this issue.
My graphics card is: NVIDIA GeForce4 Ti 4200 with AGP8X
The setting with appears to cause the problem is in the windows control panel under 3d...
No, I already looked at that thread. Turning the MFD's on or off doesn't affect it. It's the 2d panels. For example if I scroll them of the screen or switch to external view the framerate comes back to normal. It's happening with the shuttle-A and DGIV but weirdly not with the default DG.
And...
When trying Orbiter 2010, I found it would run just fine until I switched to the 2d cockpit panel for the shuttle-A, then the framerate would drop to under 1 fps. The same thing would happen with the panels for the DGIV on an otherwise clean install. Updating my graphics card drivers and...