You are looking for a new trading computer, but you aren’t sure where to start? Well, you’ve come to the right place.
Day trading as you’ve probably realized requires a powerful computer supporting multi-displays, and choosing the right computer can be something that many traders find difficult, especially if you buy an expensive one that doesn’t do the work you want it to do.
Getting serious about trading is starting by getting a professional trading system.
In this article, I will walk you through each of the important components your computer needs to have along with guidance and recommendations.
There are four important components that your computer needs to have: CPU, RAM, Video Card, and Hard Drive.
Processor
Let’s start with the CPU. This is very important to carefully choose the right CPU that better suits your need, since it is quite difficult to upgrade once you choose a model. For day trading, there is no need to buy the latest model, I would recommend to go with the Intel Core i7 processor for better performance. It has 4 cores for fast computation that any trading system needs.
The Intel Core i5 is a good alternative, if you are in tight budget. But I recommend you invest in the core i7, because most of the trading software requires a high speed, multi-core processor to run complex calculations, and high frequency clock speed per core.
I recommend: Intel Boxed Core I7-6700 FC-LGA14C 3.40 GHz 8 M Processor Cache 4 LGA 1151 BX80662I76700
Memory
Next is the memory, the bare minimum is 8GB, and the recommended RAM is 16GB which is much better. If you opt for later upgrade of the memory, you need to check if the motherboard has enough slots to allow you to add a second memory module when needed.
Hard Drive
In terms of hard drive you can choose between flash based drives (SSD) and the old spinning platter based drives (SATA). So which one is the best choice?
Well the spinning drive gives large storage for a small price, but you get slow speed. The SSD is extremely fast and very expensive compare to the SATA drive, and since you don’t need huge storage capacity, SSD is your best option to go with.
I recommend: SanDisk SSD PLUS 240GB Solid State Drive - SDSSDA-240G-G26
Video Card
The last but not least is the video card. First you need to ask yourself the following questions:
How many monitors are you using in your trading setup?
What video ports do those monitors have?
How many video card slots (PCI) do you have on your motherboard?
Are you going to need adapters to run external monitors?
So if the video card on the motherboard has only two ports, you could either add a second video card that has two additional ports, or replace the video card with a new one that has 4 ports. It all depends on your preference and budget.
Another thing to consider when choosing a video card is that I personally go for the workstation cards over gaming video cards. The workstation cards are designed to work all day long without overheating or getting noisy. This is something I recommend you double-check before making any purchase.
I recommend: NVIDIA Quadro K5000 4GB GDDR5 Graphics card (PNY Part : VCQK5000-PB)
The Monitor
I’m using a Dell U2417H UltraSharp 24'' LED-Backlit LCD Monitor, Gray that is connected via HDMI cable. For a resolution I wouldn’t recommend anything with a resolution less than 1920x1080. The larger the resolution, the denser the pixels are in the display.
This monitor has thin borders, which is perfect if you plan to use multi-display monitors. It will give you a professional looking without boundaries.
If you decide to connect a second monitor to your setup, you simple use the DisplayPort-out on your Dell monitor to get multi-display setup.
For the ports available are:
HDMI 1.4 (MHL 2.0), DisplayPort 1.2, mini-DisplayPort 1.2,
DisplayPort-out, 4 USB 3.0, and audio line-out ports.
The Dell UltraSharp monitor is an All-In-One product that is, in my opinion, perfect for day trading.
I recommend: Dell U2417H UltraSharp 24'' LED-Backlit LCD Monitor