Meta Trader 4 Strategy Tester Speed Improvment ??

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Hi Fellow Traders and Coders.

I really wish that Meta Trader 4 Strategy Tester is like Meta Trader 5 Strategy tester because Meta Trader 5 terminal strategy tester is a lot faster. T T

Really the slow speed of MT4 terminal strategy tester sometimes bottlenecking development work. I am sure it is what many developer is experiencing at the moment with Meta Trader 4 terminal.  

Does anyone has some good suggestion or solution or any ways to improve the speed of strategy tester in Meta Trader 4 terminal ?

It will be great if you share your wisdom. :)

Kind regards.

F.E.

 

There are not so many tips:

  • If your EA is working only on new bars, then there is no need to test it in all ticks mode, use just ohlc.
  • Its good to have ssd hard drive which is used for mt4 data folder (file->open data folder should open location on ssd drive). All tester files will be written and read much faster.
  • If you are using custom indicator with iCustom, but you have indicator source code - copy indicator source code directly into EA, to use it without iCustom call.
  • Thats's probably all I know :) 

 

Do the code profiling (Debug->Start Profiling), it will show all code bottleneck points. Its available only for real run attached to chart, and not available in tester; but if you will improve EA performance for real run on chart - it will be faster in tester too.

Once I have speed up EA performance for around two times based on profiling report, by changing few things like these:

//unoptimized
int array1[];
//...
for(int i=0; i<ArraySize(array1); i++){
   //...
}

//speed-optimized
int array1[];
//...
int array1size = ArraySize(array1);
for(int i=0; i<array1size; i++){
   //...
}

//unoptimized
for(int i=0; i<OrdersHistoryTotal(); i++){
   //...
}

//speed-optimized
int historysize = OrdersHistoryTotal();
for(int i=0; i<historysize; i++){
   //...
}
 
Dr.Trader:

There are not so many tips:

  • If your EA is working only on new bars, then there is no need to test it in all ticks mode, use just ohlc.
  • Its good to have ssd hard drive which is used for mt4 data folder (file->open data folder should open location on ssd drive). All tester files will be written and read much faster.
  • If you are using custom indicator with iCustom, but you have indicator source code - copy indicator source code directly into EA, to use it without iCustom call.
  • Thats's probably all I know :) 

 

Do the code profiling (Debug->Start Profiling), it will show all code bottleneck points. Its available only for real run attached to chart, and not available in tester; but if you will improve EA performance for real run on chart - it will be faster in tester too.

Once I have speed up EA performance for around two times based on profiling report, by changing few things like these:

This is superb tips. Thanks for sharing. :)

 
FinanceEngineer:

Hi Fellow Traders and Coders.

I really wish that Meta Trader 4 Strategy Tester is like Meta Trader 5 Strategy tester because Meta Trader 5 terminal strategy tester is a lot faster. T T

Really the slow speed of MT4 terminal strategy tester sometimes bottlenecking development work. I am sure it is what many developer is experiencing at the moment with Meta Trader 4 terminal.  

Does anyone has some good suggestion or solution or any ways to improve the speed of strategy tester in Meta Trader 4 terminal ?


Reading this thread may help you:  https://www.mql5.com/en/forum/144240
 
RaptorUK:
Reading this thread may help you:  https://www.mql5.com/en/forum/144240

Definitely very helpful link. Thanks.  

Sometime, wish we could have hybridized terminal between MT4 and MT5 combining best of both world.

Regards.

 

Thanks all. Mentioned links and information is really helped me.

Thanks. 

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