|
This option requires relatively little computer resources as stock, futures
and other financial data is downloaded from your data vendor to your PC and you
are probably using a 3rd party frontend trading charting software like Metastock
or SuperCharts to carry out your technical analysis. Any entry level Pentium 4, Athlon
or Celeron PC with 256MB of computer memory (RAM) & 40Gb Hard drive will suffice. A 56K dial-up modem internet connection would also be sufficient if you just need to download
end-of-day financial data to your PC hard drive.
The place where you should spend slightly more for better quality components
are the display monitor and video graphic adapter.
This is because you are going to spend a considerable time looking at stock and
futures charts so the quality of the display and the VGA card pumping out the
graphics should be your No. 1 priority.
Display Monitors
You can either use Cathode Ray Tubes (CRTs) or Flat Panel Liquid Crystal Displays
(LCDs), it does not matter but with prices of LCD monitors at such low levels, for the sake of your eyes, choose a LCD monitor (read LCDs vs CRTs for Trading Computer Systems for more information). Whichever type of monitor you eventually choose, the
next important thing to note is that the screen size should be at least 17 inches or more
to provide a decent usable viewing area for all your charts. Ideally, you should
set your screen resolution to at least 1024x768 or higher. For LCDs, you
have a choice of either digital or analog monitors and if budget is not a
constraint, it is strongly recommended that you go with the digital! The other important thing to note about LCDs is that each model has its own native resolution and if an LCD is run at other resolutions, the display will not be as crisp and appear blurry. Another factor to consider is the refresh rate of the monitor. This primarily applies to CRTs because in order to greatly reduce eyestrain when constantly looking at charts for long periods, you should ensure that the monitor you choose can
support refresh rates of at least 70Hz at the screen resolution you will be using.
Video Graphic Adapters
 Most modern systems have AGP graphic slots
so you should ideally get an AGP graphics adapter with at least 32MB onboard
RAM. Unless you also play the latest 3D games on your PC, go with graphics
adapters that are traditionally designed for business use and have excellent 2D
graphics. Matrox makes excellent 2D cards optimized for business use, like the
G400 and G550 series VGA cards, which come in dual-head and even quad-head
versions. You can also get multi-head cards from most other graphics card
manufacturers like nVidia and ATI which will enable you to connect multiple
monitors to your PC. If you already have a single head card, don't despair as
you can add an older technology PCI based graphics card to achieve the same
effect without greatly compromising on system performance.
|
