2GB of RAM will be plenty. Adding more will mostly be a waste of $$$. Your CPU usage is high... If you've got another hard drive lying around, suggest you do a fresh install of WinXP and after updating, run Tradestation only and see if it is still so high. If not, look for other culprits. (I have multiple apps running, as do we all... plus, I've also got a TV Tuner card.. my CPU most hangs around 2-5% with bounces to 10%, but I don't have Tradestation.)
Agreed 2 M would be heaps but you've got plenty now. Try shutting down your virus checker and see what it does to cpu usage with TS. Then try shutting down your firewall. If you've got any other active "checking" software shut it down as well. But I vote for the "keep your current pc, reformat the disk and do a clean install of winxp pro" school of thought.
thats a sh!tload of processes hogging your CPU. you must have a lot of progs running in the background or in systray that are taking resources up. Do you have a ton of icons showing in your systray next your PC time on the toolbar? if so, these are all running in the background and using resources. If you use your trading PC for surfing, you could also have picked up spyware/malware that is also loading your CPU up too. if you want to free up your system you need to get rid of all un-necessary clutter that loads your PC. close all the un-necessary icons in your tray, and get familiar with what the running processes are in task manager - you should be able to get it down to around 22 processes bare bones, which will make a noticeable difference in speed.
Why not just get rid of tradestation? That's what happened to me. The chart freeze everyday when the stock market really rock and roll at 9:40. I had enough of it and just go to IB. The chart is useless even if you can get it for free when it freezes everyday. So, if u are not using it for automated trading, then i cant find any reason for TS.
Here's a system that is reasonably priced and expandable. http://cgi.ebay.com/INTEL-QUAD-CORE...145670QQihZ020QQcategoryZ140075QQcmdZViewItem INTEL CORE 2 QUAD PROCESSORS Intel Core 2 Quad Processor Q6600 1066MHz 8MB LGA775 CPU INTEL PROCESSOR COOLING FAN INTEL STANDARD PROCESSOR COOLING FAN SOCKET 775 MOTHERBOARDS Asus P5B-VM LGA775 MATX Motherboard DDR2 RAM DUAL CHANNEL 4GB (4x1GB) DDR-2 667MHZ PC-5400 SATA II HARD DRIVES 320GB SATA2 7200rpm 16MB CACHE (HIGH PERFORMANCE) DVD-RW DRIVES 18X DVD-RW DUAL LAYER W/LIGHTSCRIBE PCI-EXPRESS VIDEO CARDS 256MB CHROME VIDEO ACCELERATOR (ONBOARD) SOUND CARDS 6-CHANNEL DIGITAL SOUND ONBOARD NETWORK CARDS 10/100/1000 Fast Ethernet Network Card (onboard) COMPUTER CASES BCC MID-TOWER ATX W/TEMP CONTROL LCD (BLACK) POWER SUPPLIES OKIA A-POWER 600 WATT ATX POWER SUPPLY KEYBOARDS 103 Keys PS2 Basic Keyboard (Black) MICE I-MICRO 800dpi PS/2 Optical Mouse (Black) SPEAKERS SUPER TALENT 2.0 Channel Multimedia Speaker System (Black) Software : All driver disks and manuals are included. DVD & CDRW software also included. System comes ready to load any OS (Win98, Me, 2000, XP, Vista) Operating System: Operating system is optional. If you add operating system, we will install and configure it for you. Condition : All system components are brand new. System is completely assembled and tested. Warranty 3-Year Limited Warranty w/LifeTime Free Technical Support Shipping: SHIP BY UPS/DHL GROUND, 2ND DAY AIR AVAILABLE!!! I own 2 of these and have bought systems from this guy for a while. A number of my friends have bought systems as well and we all agree these systems SCREAM! Here's a link for an under $95 valid source for Windows XP Pro 64 bit: http://www.von1.com/shopping/descriptions.php?auth=ArdqI8v4k4qFXtC4d314Xkh1dPToF5/4D9cb/+9iixs= I prefer the 64 bit OS. I've got it loaded on all of my trading computers on these systems and have not had a single problem in 18 months. Finding drivers for multihead video cards is not a problem either. I'm not using Vista yet due to bugs and trading for a living needs to be bug free.
It only has a single VGA port but I always add one of these to my systems: http://cgi.ebay.com/Matrox-G450-MMS...ryZ40160QQssPageNameZWDVWQQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem I pick these up on eBay all of the time and keep some spares around. They are workhorses.
Here's a pic of my disk. This is my new office above the garage and I'm still hanging pictures. There are 3 of us trading up here each morning.