Try going & buying the level 50 Recruit pvp gear for both you & your companion. As a sit assassin I actually leveled 48-50 on illum, that pvp gear for 50 is better than crafted pve gear currently. Also here is a handy gear guide http://dulfy.net/wp-content/uploads/2012/04/pvegearing1resized1.png

Also do not use the "Any" setting for the quality, set it upto cant remember name but its the green option.

FYI it is not your char specific, I bought it with my sith warrior & got a jedi consular crew cutomization, its bound to legacy though so eventually of some use

Also look at what lightsaber charge you are using, if you aren't using the tank form, you get ZERO benefit from using a shield

My wife & I are in the same boat as you, like to game together, & we have had our guild of 2 for almost a month now & nothing negative so far.

Thats about the system I am running, except I have a GTX 460, works great for swtor (as good as can be expected until they hdjust some of the game code)

SO I just went to get this cunning +3 datacron for my alt, & surprise surprise the landscape of the maps has been changed, a new rock pillar stands in the old jump location & the bldg that you used to jump upon its orange tent is now further away from the datacron, so even if you could get to the bldg you cannot make the jump. I do not recall seeing this change in the patch notes at all. Here is the guide I followed to get to this datacron my first run through(no issues at all) http://www.swtor-holo.net/swtor-datacron-locations/swtor-tatooine-datacron-locations.html its Datacron 6 - Empire only.