As the previous article in this series pointed out, you must be very realistic on the capabilities of the computer system that will support your own currency-trading plan. This article discusses some of the hidden parts of your trading computer system. This will influence what you should be looking for when researching out the perfect computer for your trading needs.
Motherboard
Chances are that unless you already know a lot about the actual different hardware components in a computer, that you’ll never really need to do research on motherboards. The motherboard (main board) is the piece of the puzzle that connects everything together. It is the single most important factor of the computer, because like the other components of a computer, every motherboard isn’t created equal. A quick run-down is that the motherboard needs to be compliant with the other components of the computer, thus the motherboard ultimately should be the first component that you select or know you are going to use. One processor may work on one motherboard but not on the other, and the same is true for the video cards, RAM and even hard drives (for example if it is missing a SATA controller and you are using a SATA hard drive). The most reliable names for motherboards (and I can’t stress enough that it also depends on the model) are Asus, Gigabyte and Intel.
Processors
The two major processor manufacturers are Intel and AMD. Technology has come a long way to where we now have dual-core processors, which are extremely useful for currency traders. Dual-core technology is very similar to SMP (Symmetric Multi-Processor) AKA dual-processor technology in that you have two cores to work with but with dual-core processors, it is on one single slab of silicon. Dual-core processors are extremely useful for multi-tasking, which is why they should be in your scopes for your trading computer. Intel’s highest end dual-core processor product line is called the Core 2 Duo while AMD’s is called the X2. Currently Intel’s Core 2 Duo is the highest-end processor, outweighing the AMD X2 in nearly all categories and benchmarks but comes with a little premium in price. In the future AMD plans to have a quad processor machine using dual-core processors, which should be extremely interesting.
Memory/RAM
One of the most important components of a trading computer is the system memory (RAM). Many traders believe that they need as much RAM as possible to gain an advantage. This is only partially true. It is always wise to have more RAM than needed, but more importantly is the quality of RAM being used. Processor technology moves much quicker than any other technology in computers so many times “high-end” systems get bottle-necked by having inadequate RAM timings (speed). There is no sense in having a processor that is so fast that it has to wait on the other components of the computer. For starters, traders shouldn’t have less than 1GB of system memory of any type of RAM. More importantly though are the timings of the RAM being used. There are $50 sticks of RAM and $150 sticks of RAM, with important reasons for the difference. When RAM leaves the manufacturing plant, each stick is tested and rated. Depending on the rating, it will get put into specific categories of which the higher-end, better rating RAM is more expensive. The reason is simple: there is a lot less “high rated” RAM in a batch than low performing RAM. Nearly all major computer manufacturers use the generic or low performance RAM in their systems to save on costs and keep their prices low to the end-user. Technology is moving towards the integration of DDR2 memory over DDR with the biggest difference being the higher clock speed and power savings.
Hard Drives
This is another component that is nearly always overlooked but is extremely important to the performance and reliability of a trading computer. Most traders believe that they might as well get the highest capacity hard drive as they can because they will be getting more for their money. The fact is that most traders don’t use more than 15GB of hard drive capacity, so what would be the point in getting a system with a 400GB hard drive? Similar to the memory/RAM is the quality over quantity approach. It isn’t how much capacity that is important, but yet again, the timings. When you access a file or write data to the hard drive, each hard drive has specific timings, or how fast it will do the task. Trading applications are constantly writing to the RAM and to the hard drive, so it is important to keep up with the demand. You want to definitely stick with the newer interface technology called SATA (serial ATA) rather than old IDE. I would not recommend looking into a SCSI route, as the benefit factor to traders isn’t enough to justify the overwhelming cost. So again, think quality, not quantity. If you do indeed need storage space, you can always have an external large capacity hard drive or large capacity “secondary” internal hard drive for backing up and storing files that don’t get used often.
In the next article, we will discuss some of the less hidden parts of the trading computer system.
The author, Jordan Peterson, of Custom Trading Computers, Inc. is a well-known expert in custom built high performance computers, which must be specifically designed for currency traders. Such computer systems can handle heavy volume trading periods with complete success and without any danger of locking up.
