http://www.elitetrader.com/vb/showthread.php?s=&postid=1373615#post1373615 Just reading the above problems with getting trading apps to be responsive, I must heartily endorse Priority Master at http://www.prioritymaster.com. I allows you to configure windows to boost the priority of charting and order-entry platforms and a reduction in priority of everything else. If your running a DOM or multiple fast-moving stocks or futures, this program will help enormously. No direct connection with the developer, I'm just a satisfied user.
All that program does, from what I can tell, is raise the priority of the program. You can do the same thing with the Task Manager that comes with Microsoft Windows, right click on the application in the Process tab, and select the priority. Unless you know what you are doing, the value should probably never be set to higher than "Above Normal", but it doesn't hurt to experiment... nitro
It does much more.... 1) it retains the priority settings after reboot....you don't have to reset everything every day. 2) it automatically boosts foreground programs when they are needed..ex: Internet explorer for a quick link 3) it automatically lowers priority of programs when it detects a high CPU utilization and potential instability. No question, the author has done a poor job of communicating the benefits of this program....that's why I am responding. (Note: I run my trading platform at REALTIME priority....with no side-effects or problems.)
prioritizing your trading app by neglecting system processes which handles your internet connections... trade offs?
That is exactly right. I'm especially cautious about running anything as a real time process. There is a misconception on this thread that REALTIME means fast. It does not. It means having a defined maximum response time. The OS will throw whatever is needed at it to achieve this goal. From the web site it seems that this piece of software monitors whatever it has elevated to real time and demotes it if it seems to be using too much CPU. Now this is just plain wrong - it's either realtime or it isn't. In other words this product is trying to be another scheduler on top of Windows kernel scheduler. Judging from the web site and some of the outlandish claims, it is not credible to me that this stuff supplants the work of generations of computer scientists who have studied and developed OS schedulers - ever since operating systems became more than just a simple program loader. There is nothing wrong with adjusting process priorities to improve response times - indeed it can be good practice to do so. But stay away from REALTIME unless there is a good reason to use it, and you know what you are doing.
dcraig, Taking that all into account its still interesting to see the change when you set TWS and your order entry apps to max and your charting to high. In fact even set them all to high. I've always found TWS to "come to" slowly first with an 800M PIII then a 2600+ and most recently with a core2duo e6600. But when you raise the priority it becomes as responsive as I would hope it would be. lilboy, I see the potential issue re "realtime" apps and "high" underlying processes although I think dcraig puts some of that to bed in redefining real time. If your system has sufficient power (ie your realtime apps consumption of cpu load is reasonable) then that wouldn't become an issue anyway. I'm running it on my machine (c2d and my daughters 800MPIII) and the only effect appears to be increased responsiveness. On her machine the load is high enough that one might wonder about system processes. On my (trding) machine the load is low anyway. I've been using it for a week and would pay the $19 he asks just for the convenience of automatically setting the higher priorities on startup forgetting any other capabilities. I could probably figure out how to do it myself but why bother.
Interesting dcraig, the author agrees with you and doesn't recommend that any items other than cd/dvd burners are put at real time. I might wind tws and zlt back to high and see how that impacts anything.
i set TWS (javaw.exe) to High and eSignal (winros.exe and winsig.exe) to Above Normal. I set all other user processes to Low. it does affect esignal's and TWS' performance significantly, for the better. i've been doing so for years. no problems with it.