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I had tested MultiCharts some time ago, but have had little time to use it, so I had recently installed MultiCharts Discretionary for evaluation, as I am looking for an alternative to NinjaTrader.
So my first exercise today was to load a merged contract for ES for the last 12 months.
Trapped
Had happened to me the first time, happened to me again. Just got a bunch of error messages and nothing came up. The single month contracts loaded well, so I had all the data available to build the merged contract, but nothing showed up.
Went back to my first posts on MultiCharts and after a while found out that ES has false instrument settings. Once, I had replaced CME with GLOBEX, it started loading.
A Disaster
I had hoped that, since I had already loaded the required data, MultiCharts would now display the merged contract. Not at all. Without going into details, I tried to open that chart several times, and the only thing that added up were the error messages. MultiCharts requires M contract for 2009, then H contract for 2009, then Z and U contracts for 2008, H contract for 2012. This is all nonsense, since I only wanted to display one year back from now, and no contracts for 2008, 2009 or 2012 are needed.
Next problem. The chart data is totally mixed up. Chart and screenshot below show that data for March 11, 2011 (rollover date) is followed by data of an illiquid contract for February 1. Why does MultiCharts continue data from the ESH1 contract for March 11 with data for ESM1 from February 1.
This is by far worse than everything that I have seen from NinjaTrader. Just want to post this to be fair. I Ninjatrader is bashed for its unreliability, the same thing should apply to MultiCharts.
I am relaxed and not annoyed, but surprised. This is my first experience with MultiCharts Discretionary, and I am not yet giving up. It just did not start as I expected. I will continue this experience and post here.
I believe that both NinjaTrader and MultiCharts are advanced charting programs with a lot of features. Also I believe that both NinjaTrader and MultiCharts have excellent support teams, that are willing to discuss any issues.
Whenever something is reported it can be
- a user error or misinterpretation of information
- a software bug
User errors are generally more common, but favored by unclear instructions. I do not know what my mistake has been, but I have tried all evening, and I cannot even display a merged contract for the most ordinary of all futures instruments.
My hope is that this thread will contribute to make MultiCharts a better product.
Isn't there a difference between an Alpha version and a Ready to market version?
I think this thread could be interesting but only if you compare equal versions.
You could close this thread an reopen it when MC is in Beta as it's supposed to be a very stable beta.
But even then it's still a beta.
MultiCharts is not in Alpha or Beta, I am talking about the regular marketed versions. I am referring to MultiCharts Discretionary Trader, which you can find here:
You are right, I was not aware of it. It is indeed 7.0 Alpha 3, Build 33.
But then I remember that the merging had worked with the regular version that I had tested two months ago. I wonder what makes up for the difference? Any help appreciated.