Hi guys, How much RAM do you need to run TWS ? Find that sometimes when I open the Opts chain, it is a bit slow to show all the rows and data in all the fields such as delta etc. Is this due to RAM or is it due to data bandwidth ? ( I have ok bandwidth) ?
Options chains are queries, not unlike API queries. It's a question of latency and IB server load, not your RAM or bandwidth.
There is a setting (I forgot where) in TWS which allows you to increase the maximum amount of memory allotted to TWS. By default is it set to 700~800 MB, but IB advises to increase this to a maximum of 2 GB in case you feel it to be necessary. You would need to try it out to see whether this would solve your issue.
Check the Performance tab of your Task Manager when all of your trading programs + other concurrent ones are running.
Yes, that memory setting in Global Configuration can help. But TWS is also very slow for me (on PC with 64GB RAM and 8GB set in TWS settings) to the point of being very difficult to use, especially when having hundreds or thousands of open positions - as it keeps streaming a lot of data, probably even the one I’m not looking at. This is a problem with TWS software design because other trading apps don’t have such issues. I don’t need quotes fo be streamed every millisecond. While I think TDA’s ToS software allows to set quote refresh interval, and is generally much better performing. Someone else here also mentioned in the past that TWS architecture based on Java applets is outdated.
I also allocated something like 8 or 16 GB to the max Java heap size for TWS and it still takes a while to load. It's not a Java problem. It's likely that there is a lot of bloat in the software or it was not efficiently programmed / optimized.
Possibly several IB users should submit request for a feature to allow slower data stream, possibly from a secondary IB servers designed just for that, or pulling data at some intervals. IB already seems overloaded with data requests and paces data downloads and states they’re not a data provider; but then they flood everyone with so much data they clog everyone’s desktops... If there is any one feature that TWS needs would be a better performing software with possibly slower data stream. (unless the issue lies elsewhere) The same with contract ids and other static data - I have to use TWS API and request streams of data that then cause pacing violations. While all they could do is to publish a few static csv files or basic REST server on AWS or even a cheap dedicated server, where we could download just the basic static data.
I'm not sure this is really causing problems. Looking at the incoming data stream (the network usage of my computer) I see that it measures maybe up to 100 kb/s. This data stream should not be a problem for your computer. Something else in TWS is probably responsible for causing a bottleneck on your computer.
Usually that's something around 600-700 mbs, but you can increase the total ammount of RAM allocated to TWS in settings, as I remember you can increase such number up to 2 gb, but I can be wrong.