said by JohnInSJ
:You sure its an nvidia? Most people seem to have intel on that model.
Anyway, sounds like its using the vesa driver.
check your /etc/X11/xorg.conf file for:
Driver "vesa"
If its there, delete it or comment out, then logout/in or reboot to restart X
Moving a window should not use any CPU unless you're using the vesa brain dead driver.
Yep, I'm sure it's an Nvidia card (it was running Windows before). As a sanity check, lspci confirms the make and model. I also know for sure that it's using the proprietary nvidia driver (it's in my xorg.conf, and the nvidia splash shows at startup).