I am considering buying a desktop; currently i use a laptop for my trading and it doesnt support more than one monitor. Here's the specs of Dell Optiplex 9010 (small form) that i have my eyes on. With the dual graphics card, it can support upto four monitors. Let me know if this system is powerful enough to handle everyday's daytrading activities or if there's anything else i should opt for. Note that the current system (small form) is already maxed out except fot the RAMS which might be upgraded to 32GB (currently at 16GB) but for a Quad Core (which is maxed out) i believe 16GB is enough. Not sure it's enough for trading though. Priced at around $1350. Let me know what you think. Processors 3rd Gen Intel® Core⢠i7-3770 (Quad Core, 3.40GHz, 8MB w/HD4000 Graphics) Operating System(s) Windows 7 Ultimate, No Media, 64-bit, English OptiPlex 9010 SFF OptiPlex 9010 Small Form Factor w/ up to 90% Efficient PSU Memory 16GB, NON-ECC, 1600MHZ DDR3,4DIMM Removable Media Storage Device 8X Slimline DVD+/-RW Graphics Cards DUAL 1GB AMD RDN HD7470,LP,w/VGA Boot Hard Drives 500GB Hybrid 2.5â 3.0Gb/s SATA2 with 4GB SLC NAND Flash edit Second Hard Drive Options 500GB Hybrid 2.5" SATA 6Gb/s with 8GB SLC NAND Flash edit Hard Drive Mode RAID 0 (High Performance)
hmmm.. too much money? but it all depends... personally here is what I would do.. 2 x NVIDIA NVS 310 Graphics Card or you can get the NVS510... that will allow you to drive 4 x 27" at native res... you can always go lower of course... I would then get one of the following... OCZ Technology 128GB Vertex 4 OCZ Technology 256GB Vertex 4 and lastly... I would get a refurbished deal... it can be from DELL or HP.. (I prefer HP)... just to give you an idea, nothing more... NVIDIA NVS 310 512MB Graphics Rmkt Card $110 2 $220.00 HP 8300 W7P-64 i7 3770 3.4GHz 250GB SATA 8GB DVDRW Intel HD Rmkt CMT PC $679 1 $679.00 OCZ Technology 256GB Vertex 4 Series 239 1 $239.00 OCZ Technology 128GB Vertex 4 Series 125 1 $125.00 $1,263.00 add to it... an external USB mirrored drive... 3TB or so... keep your backups there.
The future is http://www.intel.com/content/www/us...rboards/next-unit-computing-introduction.html 4*4 " two hdmi ports.
it all comes down to what your requirements are... so that would be the future for some users, while not others...
The three hdmi i5 comes out in the summer. intel are stopping making desktop motherboards after haswell to focus on nuc.
This system has more than 1,000X the horsepower needed for trading. If you want to save some money, get a used workstation with dualcore or quadcore CPU and at least 2 PCIEx16 slots for video cards. Shouldn't cost more than a few $Hundred and should last 5 years. Personally, I don't like SFF. If the PSU goes out, you're likely to have to order a replacement rather than bopping over to Best Buy and picking one up. (I had a SFF PSU blow up on me... sent the computer back to the vendor for replacement. Also, the optic drive is the least reliable component of a computer. If a SFF one goes bad, I don't know how easy it is to get at it inside the box to replace.) ofthomas has the right idea about video cards, except the ones he mentioned have a fan. I like those with no fan for trading... like Quadro NVS 290/295/300, GeForce 8400, FirePro 2260.
processing power is all relative to what one is doing... some of my custom indicators on CQGIC evaluate every incoming tick, others dont... doing calculations will consume CPU resources... use a "less powerful" CPU and you will pay a price in latency on those calcs... if we were talking about thousands extra, I would agree... but a top of the line refurb can be had for less than $700... which is about what one will spend anyhow... and as to the two tiny fans... they make no noise... trust me...
That little Intel NUC can push 4 monitors too in mosaic mode (extended desktop between two pairs.) But, as cool as it might be, I can't see myself ever suggesting it to traders.
Whenever you do this its a good idea to envision how you plan to use the machine. What trading platform - what are its cpu and memory needs What additional software I run large large optimizations with NinjaTrader 7 Windows 64 Bit on a home-made box with an AMD Phenom 2 and 4 gig of memory I never even come close to using all the CPU or memory on this box.