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just wondering if anyone has/is overclocked their trading computers.... i am aware that overclocking will or may* reduce reliability, more likely will.
but just curious if anyone from futures.io (formerly BMT) community is trading on an OC'd comp. If you are... is it worth it? does it speed things up in backtesting, loading charts, or having many charts/workspaces opened etc?
Or is it just not worth the worry and reliability issues.
Thanks
Can you help answer these questions from other members on NexusFi?
I have 2 of my 4 trading PC's overclocked. Seems to help mostly in backtesting/optimizations when all the CPU is being used. Reliably my i7-3770k will run at 4.5 GHz during backtesting. Over that I get intermittent crashes. Could probably do better if I spent more time tuning it. I believe when I over clocked it I got 20-30% reduced backtesting time. Recommend water cooler for CPU if u do it. I'm running a h100i corsair cooler made a big difference in CPU temps.
Another thing I noticed with Ninja is if in a optimization u run up to ur max memory. It seems to swap around a lot and not use 100% of your CPU. So make sure U have enough memory. I'm running 32 Gig and will max that out on some optimizations.
are your oc'd comps for backtesting and optimizations only or do u trade with them as well?
good to keep in mind about ram as i'm only running 16gb right now so may consider to add later on if needed.
My over clocked PCs r development and test PCs. My production PC runs 30 to 40 strategies and has a dozen charts and still doesn't come near pegging all 8 threads in the cores or using all my memory so I c no need to over clock it.
So far with Ninja I only c backtesting/optimizing pegging all 8 threads on my cores above 90% and sucking up all 32 Gig of ram.
If u have many charts with many indicators loading slow. Look at the CPU while loading 2 c if its pegged. That will tell u if u could use faster CPUs. Most of the time its more in tuning the indicators ur using or reducing the lookback period on ur charts. Check out the thread on RAM drive for that.
To make it all simple you need to follow the gamers - buy what they buy. I have been running an Intel i7-3770K 8-core cpu base rate 3.5GHz at 4.6GHz for over 9 months - not one fault. The motherboard is an ASUS Maximus V. It runs 2 NVIDIA GeForce GTX 660 Ti, and supports 3 digital HDMI screens SyncMaster P2770H; and it all runs on 16gb Vengence ram - DDR3 6400. The hard drive is an Intel 520 SSD 240Gb. All runs every day smooth as silk. BTW it has a 1200w power supply from Corsair, and a super large case with numerous extra fans. I have thought of water cooling - as the mobo is built for that -- but why bother, Ninja is single threaded. Also one should use a Windows 7 Gadget called "Core Temp" on screen to monitor events and Temp. And nothing beats a Nascita mouse, and a Logitech G19 keyboard.
Now the good news. Asus provides free with the mobo, a software that automatically tests and configures your system at the maximum stable speed, cpu, ram, and video cards. It could not be easier; it auto sets the highest your system can go.
It is easy to build, and easy to maintain on Win7.
Just to add to this post. I'm running a ASUS Sabertooth motherboard on one PC and a MSI Big Bang MPower on the other. Both have auto tuning software 4 clock speeds etc. . Both have software that allow u to overclock on the fly with Windows 7 up and running. Between the 2 the MSI BigBang MPower seems to b made more 4 over clocking then the ASUS Sabertooth.
I have a p9x79 deluxe Asus board with a I7-3930k cooled with a corsair H100 and it is overclocked to 4.2 using the included AI suite. Stable and no problems. Very easy to do. It's as fast as the space shuttle compared to the Pentium dual core I used to have.
I had the same question now due I'm looking for a new trading PC. From Eddie Z (tradingcomputersnow.com) which has been recommended in another thread in this forum, I've received the following answer regarding the Intel i7-4770K:
" ... Intel came out with the K versions of processors. K versions are Easy to overclock and have some built in failsafes. I am so comfortable overclocking these that we warranty them for 5 years.
We use premium liquid cooling and a Military Grade motherboard to account for the heat. The processor only reaches for the extra power WHEN NEEDED now due to something called Intel Speedstep. In the past, the processor remained in the overclocked mode the entire time, Its much easier and safer to overclock now..."
I think that explains it and I feel comfortable now to go with an OC up to 4.5 Ghz.