The Cloud for Automated Trading/NT

dom993 · Aug 7, 2013

Quote from CalVolibrator:

its a horrible service and price/performance ratio. If latency really matters then you would co- or proximity locate with exchanges or ecns or brokers you connect to. But you would do it by renting rack space and deploy your own server. The memory provided by the firm you named is laughable and it almost sounds like its not even a dedicated server they offer. But even if it is their prices are outrageous, not absolutely speaking but relative to what they offer). Even to host a few websites I would rent a better equipped server.

Well, I am a happy customer ... who said "latency really matters" ? Beside, their VPS are hosted in the NYC & Chicago Steadfast datacenters, and latency is pretty low.

You appear to know next to nothing re. VPS ("it almost sounds like its not even a dedicated server they offer", of course, a VPS - aka VM - is just a slice of a server), 1Gb to 3Gb is a very common range, and Windows 2008.R2 has a very low memory footprint.

Go play paintball, you might have a better time than trolling here.

CalVolibrator · Aug 7, 2013

that is exactly what I said, and I said using a rented VPS is ridiculous to run trading algorithms on, unless of course you are begging for trouble, are a disguised sales person for this particular company, or are the one who is clueless.

Quote from dom993:

Well, I am a happy customer ... who said "latency really matters" ? Beside, their VPS are hosted in the NYC & Chicago Steadfast datacenters, and latency is pretty low.

You appear to know next to nothing re. VPS ("it almost sounds like its not even a dedicated server they offer", of course, a VPS - aka VM - is just a slice of a server), 1Gb to 3Gb is a very common range, and Windows 2008.R2 has a very low memory footprint.

Go play paintball, you might have a better time than trolling here.

promagma · Aug 8, 2013

Quote from CalVolibrator:

that is exactly what I said, and I said using a rented VPS is ridiculous to run trading algorithms on, unless of course you are begging for trouble, are a disguised sales person for this particular company, or are the one who is clueless.

It's far from "ridiculous", if you

1) Care about milliseconds, not microseconds
2) Care about the difference between $40/mo and $100-150/mo+ plus hardware hassles for a dedicated server
3) Find a reliable provider (easier said than done), and always monitor your latency and "hardware" performance to verify it

CalVolibrator · Aug 8, 2013

So, $40 gets you a VPS, $100-150 a dedicated server. So, you are telling us that the price difference is arbitrary? We must be talking different worlds if $40 is affordable to run your systematic strategies on but $150 is not. Sorry I misunderstood your requirements and setup, I guess we run on very different cost structures and expected return levels.

Quote from promagma:

It's far from "ridiculous", if you

1) Care about milliseconds, not microseconds
2) Care about the difference between $40/mo and $100-150/mo+ plus hardware hassles for a dedicated server
3) Find a reliable provider (easier said than done), and always monitor your latency and "hardware" performance to verify it

Nab · Aug 8, 2013

Quote from CalVolibrator:

So, $40 gets you a VPS, $100-150 a dedicated server. So, you are telling us that the price difference is arbitrary? We must be talking different worlds if $40 is affordable to run your systematic strategies on but $150 is not. Sorry I misunderstood your requirements and setup, I guess we run on very different cost structures and expected return levels.

I guess many on ET would be happy to make in average $1k/m

Hence, having 1% fixed cost instead of 15% (nowadays you can find a descend linux VPS for $10/m if you look hard enough, which is for most cases sufficient if you work on timeframes >= secs) one might see as an argument for VPS, at least for the little guys ...

slickpick · Aug 8, 2013

Quote from CalVolibrator:

So, $40 gets you a VPS, $100-150 a dedicated server. So, you are telling us that the price difference is arbitrary? We must be talking different worlds if $40 is affordable to run your systematic strategies on but $150 is not. Sorry I misunderstood your requirements and setup, I guess we run on very different cost structures and expected return levels.

I read through your posts and here are my thoughts.

1) I don't know what your IT budget is, but I'd imagine most people on this website are trading fairly small accounts. It doesn't seem like the differential between monthly rates matters much, rather the upfront hardware cost for a dedicated solution that will kill it for most people.

2) Unless you're running strategies that require a massive IT infrastructure (e.g. proper high frequency), you're not going to need powerful machine with high memory for automated trading. That being said, given from what I've read here I don't think physical proximity is where people's (i.e. elitetrader users) latency bottlenecks would be.

3) You will have higher flexibility with a VPS, as you could "move" the server even if it's still running. Some downsides are like mentioned latency issues and also last time I checked there are time drift issues with visualization.

Bottom line is that people will have different requirements dependent on budget and strategy. That being said, I have 3 servers colo'd in tribeca and no complaints thus far with exception to sandy.

EliteTraderNYC · Aug 9, 2013

While we're on the subject, perhaps you guys can recommend a provider, here are my needs:

Ninjatrader platform trading ES futures
My system is a swing trading system trading once a day or less
Connection to broker and Kinetick data service stays connected 24/7
Limited Restarts
Low budget/Individual/nonprofessional
Security is important I don't want someone stealing my strategy
Broker is Interactive Brokers

nitro · Aug 9, 2013

Quote from promagma:

If you have a reliable provider - it's wonderful. You don't have to worry when you travel, local electricity/internet outages, etc. If your provider isn't reliable - it's endless headaches.

I first used the Amazon cloud, which of course was reliable (except for the one time it famously went down, about a year ago). But it is in Virginia and latency to my broker in NY was 10ms, not bad but the latency was not steady - regularly spiking to 50-200ms for several minutes at a time.

So I tried some VPS in NYC (or across the river in Secausus). I ended up trying 4 different providers. Two were just nightmares, with crashes and network downtime. One good one was Automated VPS, about 5ms latency to my broker. Now I use CNS, and have had 100% uptime for the past year, they even have a chart for latency to popular brokers. Latency to my broker is a steady 2-3ms

Windows and VPS only hosting as far as I can see, so very limited. That they give ping times is good.

nitro · Aug 9, 2013

I have read all this stuff about VPS not being worth it. That is incorrect there is nothing wrong with it for retail type strategies or more generally strategies that are not latency dependent. I know people that are making $10k a day using a friggin GUI and click trading.

dom993 · Aug 9, 2013

Quote from EliteTraderNYC:

While we're on the subject, perhaps you guys can recommend a provider, here are my needs:

Ninjatrader platform trading ES futures
My system is a swing trading system trading once a day or less
Connection to broker and Kinetick data service stays connected 24/7
Limited Restarts
Low budget/Individual/nonprofessional
Security is important I don't want someone stealing my strategy
Broker is Interactive Brokers

Security: as long as you transfer the strategy as a compiled (using CLiSecure) NinjaScript, and that you embed within a check of MachineID (NinjaTrader.Cbi.License.MachineId) vs a list of authorized (by you) MachineId, with an expiry date in all cases, you will have really limited risk.

If using Kinetick, use the IQfeed connector, as the Kinetick one isn't quite reliable through transient Internet disconnect/reconnect.

To keep TWS up throughout the week, use IBController.

No matter what, make sure your strategy can be disabled / enabled with positions & open-orders on, and not lose track of anything, since you will sooner or later have to reload the historical data, update your strategy, restart Ninja or the VPS, all of those situations require a strategy stop / restart.

I strongly suggest running your strategy on IB simulated account for a number of weeks before using it on your live account, as this will allow you to discover real-life operations issues (eg. one stock splits, while you have a position on), and address them with no pressure.