Which prebuilt computer will help me run 2-3monitors while multitasking?

mgookin said:
Something outside of that.

First and foremost, I strongly suggest a trading computer is a dedicated machine. All it does is trade. It does not do the newswires, it does not do backtesting, it does not do gaming, etc.

But if you're insisting all of this happens on one machine, here's my take:

As much RAM as you can fit in the box. To do all of that with 16GB RAM is not smart in my opinion. Your programs run in the RAM and RAM is cheap. The more you have going on, the more clogged your RAM will be. To do everything you're saying, get 32 or 64GB of ram.

At least 4 cores at 3.0gHz or higher. Consider even more cores.

For the gaming you'll want a high priced graphics card. I don't do gaming so I'll stay out of that one. Go to a gaming forum and ask what they use. If you go light on the gaming card it's going to push over to your cpu and you don't want that.

Now let's talk brand. Dell is the only way to go in my opinion. Use Dell Small Business and you'll get great service from English speaking persons in the USA who do whatever it takes. Don't have a small business? Just use your name as company name - it works fine and they're fine with it too. There's a guy on here named Scat who is a pro in Dell resales (whatever they call that) and he'll find you a kick ass box on the cheap. You can always buy your RAM from Newegg after you get your box.

I have messed with computers since the 1970's. I own more than 30 computers today. I have bought them, built them, written code, I have robots that build robots and they all run on computers, etc. and I've used them for trading during the most volatile times in history, etc. and never missed a beat. If you biuld or buy what you proposed in your post, you're going to be stumbling. I would guess that on today's market you'll spend $1500-$3000 to have a good, reliable box to do what you want.

Another suggestion, use that laptop for a dedicated trading box and buy a new multi-task pc that's not critical and won't cost so much. That way the critical machine is the trading box; who cares if your gaming machine locks up.

Good luck!
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thank you sir!
What exactly do you mean by a "dedicated trading box"?
Is it just to place orders on a brokerage website?

The need for me to upgrade my current laptop is because it can't handle 10+charts at once. So if by dedicated trading box consists of running multiple charts and placing orders...I don't know if that will be a go.
 
heavenskrow said:
f. I have also started backtesting using ThinkonDemand and currently my computer can handle it but still very slow...
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Another reason that I dumped thinkDesktop was that ThinkonDemand was not good enough . I reported two bugs to TDAmeritrade two years ago. As of December 2013, they were still there.

However, nothing is perfect. Sierra Chart is well known to be fast, and has advanced replay functionality. But their graphics, eg. arrows , trendlines, channels, etc., are very ugly compared to those from thinkDesktop.
 
heavenskrow said:
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What is the exact reason that I should have a dedicated trading computer?
Does running multiple charts/programs slow/take up that much memory on a good computer?
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Most traders want to protect their trading account. If you only have $1,000 in there and it's just a hobby, then maybe you don't need a dedicated machine. If you have $500,000 in there and you're heavy into futures on volatile days and it's what you rely on for income, it's worth protecting.

By having a dedicated machine you do several things:
Less chances of virus & malware letting someone get to your account.
Less chance of the above causing problems that could get you stuck in trades which you need to get out of.
Who cares if your gaming machine locks up as long as you can still access your positions.
If it only does one thing, it has much less chance of things going wrong.
Doing all those other things just adds more potential for problem.

To have a dedicated $2,000 machine to earn $200,000 per year is very worthwhile for professional traders. And it's even worthwhile to have a 2nd machine with a redundant data connection in case something happens to the first one.

Assess your own risk appetite and make your own decision. If you're a light trader, it sounds like you just want a new computer and one of the things it will do is light trading. On that note, just go buy whatever makes you happy.

I still stick by Dell Small Business.

Good luck.
 
. . . got - laptop I got for Christmas. want - monitors at least3.... maybe 4. S[/QUOTE said:
Sir Scatophagos suggests, and after doing so I concur, that you will like one of these.
When you outgrow it, you'll be positioned to retain Winston to configure systems for your entire trading floor.
Done
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easymon1 said:
Sir Scatophagos suggests, and after doing so I concur, that you will like one of these.
When you outgrow it, you'll be positioned to retain Winston to configure systems for your entire trading floor.
Done
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Has plenty of horsepower for trading, but not sure about gaming.
 
I've been messing around a bunch lately on Dell Outlet and the Optiplex 7010 Small-Form-Factor will run native 3x monitors on the motherboard without the need for an add-in card.

They are right around or just below your budget, come with a 3-year warranty and OS pre-loaded.
 
mgookin said:
Most traders want to protect their trading account. If you only have $1,000 in there and it's just a hobby, then maybe you don't need a dedicated machine. If you have $500,000 in there and you're heavy into futures on volatile days and it's what you rely on for income, it's worth protecting.

By having a dedicated machine you do several things:
Less chances of virus & malware letting someone get to your account.
Less chance of the above causing problems that could get you stuck in trades which you need to get out of.
Who cares if your gaming machine locks up as long as you can still access your positions.
If it only does one thing, it has much less chance of things going wrong.
Doing all those other things just adds more potential for problem.

To have a dedicated $2,000 machine to earn $200,000 per year is very worthwhile for professional traders. And it's even worthwhile to have a 2nd machine with a redundant data connection in case something happens to the first one.

Assess your own risk appetite and make your own decision. If you're a light trader, it sounds like you just want a new computer and one of the things it will do is light trading. On that note, just go buy whatever makes you happy.

I still stick by Dell Small Business.

Good luck.
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Well said great points.

I personally use my laptop (Mac) as my mess around computer doing whatever I want on it without worrying. I purchased a low/medium budget computer for trading and do basically nothing else on it. I have also purchased a high quality UPS to run my computer/modem/router on. I am in the process of planning on somehow being able to use a wireless 4G connection or something similar in the case of internet loss.
 
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