It’s been at 44* F for2 weeks and i thinkit’s done. I started dropping the temp 2 degrees per day (at 38 now). Can i just take it straight down to 28-30 and hold it there for a couple weeks? What are the benefits? I dont want to rush things, but is there much difference?
There’s two different ways to handle a lager. One is to slowly drop the temp down to ensure the yeast are still working (2 degrees per day as you mentioned) and cleaning up yeast by products and finishing attenuation, the other is to warm the beer up to the high 50s and hold to clean up yeast byproducts and be sure attenuation is reached. The latter is by far the easier and most full proof method IME. In the latter you let the beer completely finish fermentin and then you can just cold crash it down to 32 degrees without having to worry about slowly dropping the temp.
In your case I would take a gravity reading to be sure be is done and to also taste it. If the gravity reading where you want it and the flavor is where you want it you can probably just drop the temp down. If not you may actually want to warm the fermentation up and perhaps rouse the yeast.
I always bring my lagers up to room temperature for a couple of days and then crash.
+1
+2 
Kai has a few fermentation, D-rest, and lagering profiles on his site.
About halfway down this page.
http://braukaiser.com/wiki/index.php?title=Fermenting_Lagers
At 44F, you are fermenting almost 50% slower than at 52F. For every 18 degrees, reaction rates double. A beer that required 2 weeks to ferment at 52F would likely take 3 weeks at 44F, maybe even 4 if a large percentage of the yeast were lulled to sleep. A gravity reading is your best friend right now. Taste it too, and see if you should do a diacetyl rest before crashing.
HMMM, I racked today at 32* and there is a funky sort of off flavor/smell. almost like rotten vegetables, maybe cooked corn? wondering what i did wrong. Infection perhaps? is it too late for a DR?
cooked corn is DMS. rotten vegetables sounds more like some kind of bacterial infection. I am not sure if there is anything to be done about either of those but others will give better advice!
Are you sure its not just a typical sulfurous lager aroma? Assuming that you’re right and it is DMS, another source would be using a high percentage of Pils malt (that should be typical of a Schwartz) and not having a long and strong enough boil to drive off DMS and precursors.
I agree with the DMS comment. Also, at 44F, you may not have had an active enough ferment to drive off a lot of sulfur.
Took a sample to the master brewer at a Gordon Biersch and he said it was diacetyl. It was cold when we first tasted it and you couldnt really taste it. But when we slightly warmed some and cooled to room temp you could really taste/smell it. It’s not as bad as i first thought. I am going to bring the beer up to 50* andtry kreusening with some active yeast for a week and see if it will drop the diacetal. I’ll let you know what happens.
I’ve done that a couple times and it’s worked well. Good luck to ya!
+3 thats a foolproof way IME! Ale temps I find are great for D-rests. You should not get any ale-flavors if the bulk of the fermentaion was at lager primary temps. I start the temp rise just short of terminal gravity, that way you are assured that the yeast are still very active and will remain active for clean up.
I was thinking about using a different strain of (lager) yeast for the DR. how much (if any) will this change the flavor of the beer?