Yes, I just picked up 2 old HP Z220 SFF workstations and I amazed how fast that old Xeon is. [ 0.000000] DMI: Hewlett-Packard HP Z220 SFF Workstation/1791, BIOS K51 v01.87 06/10/2019 dmesg | grep Xeon [ 0.132193] smpboot: CPU0: Intel(R) Xeon(R) CPU E3-1240 V2 @ 3.40GHz (family: 0x6, model: 0x3a, stepping: 0x9) I was helping a friend and was offered both of those for $50 all-in. Even though I don't need any I couldn't resist the price and thought I could run some Python libraries. Even the Windows 10 bloat is lightning fast on them.
I live in Singapore now and I get 1 Gbps (1000 Mbps) on fiber for less than US$ 30 a month. This is cheaper and faster than the internet I get in the States. I scalp, so speed is everything.
Internet speed isn't important for trading . Look in the task manager how much internet your platform is actually using, it will be very low.
1000 Mbps is not really a speed. It's the amount of data you can receive per second. Like Scat said before, latency is what matter. Remember that the speed at which data travel is constant. The time it takes from point A to point B depends on the distance and the number of hops between the 2 points. 1000 Mbps or 10 Mbps won't make any difference to send a couple of orders per seconds.
I live across the globe in Asia. Need to max my internet as much as possible to get some sort of level playing field vs someone who is trading in the States. If connection speed is not an issue, why do HFT shops co-located their severs with the exchange? At the end of the day, it depends on what strategy you are doing. I am doing some sort of HFT scalping. Of course if you are swing trading or long term buy and hold, it doesn’t make a difference. If you are doing high speed trading, it makes a world of difference. It is dangerous to generalize and give advice without understanding the full context. It does more harm than not saying anything.
There are two parameters related to data transfer which you must know about: one is internet speed, to other one is latency. Internet speed measures how many Mbit per unit of time can be transferred. Latency measures the time delay between the time it was sent and the time of arrival. In your case: you can have a speed of 1 Gbps, but if it is delayed by one minute (has a latency of 1 minute) than that speed is absolutely useless to you. HFT companies co-locate to reduce the delay time, to reduce the latency. The latency is not only caused by the length of the cables between source and destination, but also by all electronic modules in between which send, repeat and receive the data stream. By co-locating can most of these electronics be removed, and can cable length be minimized.
Thanks for all your replies. I understand the differences between bandwidth, latency and throughput. Say you are in my shoes. You trade from the other side of the globe. What hardware/software/internet setup would you use to increase your edge vs someone trading in the States? I scalp and hold my trades for just few seconds.
You said you are doing HFT scalping so i am assuming it is automated. You can run your system on a server closer the exchange so you drastically reduce the latency.