I'm debating this same issue and I'm curious what the OP decided to use. I don't do any trades during the day, so all my chart studying is done outside market hours. Basically i want to set up charts of everything I want and just cycle through them. So far it seems Stockcharts.com is perfect. I just find it expensive. And I'm not sure if Murphy's message is worth it.
I use stockcharts.com when I'm on the road and my laptop is out of reach, especially when I'm overseas and internet cafes are the best way to ocassionally hook up. Obviously, they are a server-side program which makes it dependent on page updates, instead of faster data-only updates from a client-side program, but when in a pinch, and for research, stockcharts.com is ok. The trading station charting solution is clearly a client-side program, QuoteTracker is my #1 choice.
If you don't do any intraday trading or need real time data. Stockcharts is perfect. I used to subscribe to e-signal and it was very expensive. I also do swing trading and use stockcharts all the time. If you want a desktop software open an account @ think or swim. They have great charts that are comparable with e-signal and have loads of features. I opened an account at think or swim with minimum equity just to take advantage of the charts.
I've been an "Extra" subscriber to stockcharts.com for a while now. I use the scanning feature to find stocks that meet my various criteria (for options trading). Then I save the scan results to a folder and go through them in the "Candleglance" format. That way I can quickly do a bulk analysis of the charts to cull out flat-lines (take-overs, etc) and other undesirables. The main problem with desktop apps is getting data onto your workstation. Data subscriptions for various tools seem pretty usurious to me. The main advantage of stockcharts.com is they have the data and do the scanning for you and it's pretty fast. All you need is web access. The other thing is how fancy you want your scans to be. Stockcharts.com scans a fairly large set of indicators, but you can't do any backtesting. Offline tools like Wealth Lab are built for backtesting as well as daily scanning for signal alerts.
All, You might check out "eSignal On Demand" that provides both EOD and Intraday charting without the high costs of real time data access. Up to 1 minute bar charts (1,5,15,30, etc) and covers virtually all global stock and futures markets in the world. Only $24.95 and no exchange fees with all the power of the eSignal charting engine. http://www.esignal.com/esignal/esignal_ondemand.aspx Chuck @eSignal
To update the thread, I signed up for stockcharts.com and I really like it. I can very quickly go through my list of charts and I like the charts and indicators. Much better than QuoteTracker (for viewing at least) and Fidelity's ActiveTraderPro (which sucks really, but it's fast).
You know I thought about that a couple of times. I did a few moving average lines on their charts and did the same on the charts of Think or Swim. They were not at the same levels.
They weren't the same but did you independently calculate what the MAs should be? Then you'd know who's wrong.
No need to calculate moving averages. The price charts themselves are flawed. And I am not talking about a rare mistake for some exotic stock. Charts for major US stocks are distorted. For example check their chart for GE.