NX-6110 proformance degrade after each upgrade

I am running HP-Compac NX-6110 with 2 gig ram 2.13 Pentien M. I915 Video it runs pretty well in 9.4. I tried to use 9.10, 10.4, 10.10, or 11.4 even with a clean load the performance degrades from 9.4. I have loaded xubuntu 11.4 but the system hangs after a while. Seems hotter then normal. I have went back to 9.4 several times trying to get a good funtioning system but 9.4 is not supported any more.

I have spent the last 2 weeks trying to compile a updated kernel that will work better but I am unable to get all the functions to work or it is just as slow as the distro. I have a noticable screen blink also as the distrobutions get higher it happens more and more and for longer durations but after I load 9.4 they go away.

I am not sure what I need to do or how I can fix this. I am not sure if it is the GUI or if it is the kernel that is making the screen blink. I am not sure how I woulld be able to tell.

I have 2 hard drives, one is my stable 9.4 system and the other one is my test drive so if I need to do something I can just put in the other drive and boot to a known good system.