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Data provider selection. IB, Esignal, IQFeed, Others???
Thank you all for your answers. BigMike I posted it here because I needed to know about IQ feed. MC was just a secondary question. (I know I have MC as my first question but it should be the second one...my bad ) I didn't want to create a new thread because of such question.
Can you help answer these questions from other members on NexusFi?
Either way, I have a question that is difficult to find the answer to and is shrouded in mystery. Does VSA work in Forex?
eSignal provides an aggregated tick volume count, correct?
I can't find any such confirmation that IQFeed provides this... I guess I'll call cust support.
Either way, IQ Feed provides Forex data back to 2005 on a per minute basis, where eSignal is only 6 months.. Is this the main reason IQ Feed is overall better? Is the gap control of the two of them similar? I haven't heard many issues from eSignal's unfiltered data that suggest it's far behind IQ Feed in the quality.
If in fact IQF does not provide aggregated tick volume then eSignal would be my choice, even if I'm slightly giving up on quality. eSignal full service looks to be $134/month. IQ Feed will run $85/month will level 2 I believe, plus a $50 start up fee.
I really want to test VSA strats myself to see if I can find a way for them to work for me in forex. But, if they don't work significantly then eSignal wouldn't be worth it.
Yes it should work. No need to have an exact volume. Aggregated volume is like an election poll. You won't get an exact value, but you will get the sentiment of the crowd.
VSA and other tool are only, tool by themselves. There is a lot more to get a profitable system.
Good luck, be patient and be prepare to study and practice a lot.
I opted to keep IB as my data provider until I stabilized my trading technics. It is free and has limited impact on my profitability result. Bad habits, bad execution or bar signal interpretation has much more effect than a better data provider could give me.
IB data as serious limitations in historical data and in tick delivery. Until I could prove to be profitable on a regular basis, I will stick with IB to limit my expenses. Capital is needed to trade, not to to be spend on a better product... my opinion...
IB data feeds the Front End [ButtonTrader] and Entry Charts [MultiCharts]
One of the benefits of IB data is its reliability which is a result of their snapshot data.
Considering I only use time based charts, no tick or volume charts, IB's snapshot data is more than sufficient to drive my order entry. Price on charts also coincides with price in ButtonTrader as they are using the same feed. [In Forex the difference can be noticeable]
Tradestation data is used for Research & Longer term charts ONLY!!
For Historic long term charting, I haven't been able to locate a source which provides more history than Tradestation. It is convenient to load symbols, good organization, and I am comfortable with easylanguage.
However, Tradestation Data will lag in a fast market and I do not recommend it for live trading, platform crashes too frequently to be trusted... [I had bad experiences with order execution years ago, and won't use them as a Broker either]
Interesting fact, you can feed Multicharts with Tradestation Data and Multicharts processes it better than Tradestations own Platform
For live trading I only rely on Multicharts and the broker's feed [IB] for intra-day charting -- Rock solid combination
IQfeed is a solid reliable datafeed
[for an intraday trader is a very good option, for my swing positions I prefer more historical data]
I have used IQfeed in the past satisfactorily, due to my geographical location [europe] and ISP had latency issues, shouldn't be a factor for US based traders, or those in regions not afflicted with a throttled ISP...
MC has a Data comparison page in its support section:
MultiCharts homepage / Brokers & Feeds / Features / Supported Data Feeds
I might have to disagree on this aspect. With the multi-core enabled TS 9.1/9.2 - there are no lagging issues that I have observed during fast markets and everything is very snappy with TS.
Same is the case with MC ( but loading of TS data into MC is very slow compared to TS - which could be due to the native data in TS ).
No arguments, I agree with you that the new multi-threaded TS is a great improvement, however, I still experience occasional freezing and continuous Platform crashes when trying to save work spaces in the newest version of TS. When contacted support I was told I had corrupted workspaces.
I built a new i7 system with 16gb Ram dedicated to the new TS 9.1 [current update 12], rebuilt all my workspaces from scratch hoping to eliminate the problems and didn't solve the crashing issue's. It is extremely frustrating, hence my non reliance intraday.
I maintain three separate systems, so I highly doubt any system is over taxed or has software conflicts.
1, General purpose, Office, Web, etc...
2, Charting [Tradestation]
3, Order entry [IB-ButtonTrader-MC]
I also agree loading the TS data in MC is tedious, but I use 5-sec volume exhaustion as [one] of my confirmations. Minimum resolution on TS is one-minute, where MC will process TS data to the second... for my intraday trading that is a benefit. [I should have clarified my statement in the previous post]
On the flip side, MC doesn't provide Time and sales, so I must rely on either TS or IB time and sales for that information.
Not one platform is perfect, if there was I definitely would use it... so I still rely on the combination of platforms.
Regarding Tradestation as a Brokerage [To Clarify]
Being that I am in Europe, my Trading hours are between ~ 0200 EST to 1700 EST.
A few years back, I opened the platform and saw a position that I did not execute [phantom order] I closed the position immediately and contacted Support. I asked them to research the situation and confirm that I was flat on ALL positions... Their reply: they did not know my positions and I would need to call back during RTH to speak with someone then [>4hrs]!!! Leave it to say, I pulled all funds except the minimum amount to cover platform fees...
For charting I still prefer Tradestation as it is much easier to use than MC, desktops, workspaces, symbol lookup, tabbed quotemgr, time & sales, +++... but for reliability, been burned too many times...
From what I have read, the occasional freezing likely occurred during backtesting for you? The new TS does supports multicore functionality but not in the backtesting environment, which is limited to using 1 core (from what I have read, which is why I too have ruled out TS as a platform).
My next question is about Tradestation's data. As it does display a mammoth amount. You mentioned it's organized and friendly, but does it come with tick volume data??? That is my main concern. I will forego huge amounts of historic data for the chance to use minimum 1 month of aggregated tick volume data (eSignal provides - trying to verify another provider).
This is really important to me. I was 90% sure I finally selected MC/IB/anon feed as my setup, but this lack of T&S issue in MC is disturbing. How big an issue is using IB's T&S? Is it a nuisance?
The more I use it the happier I am with Rithmic. Other feeds may be faster but Rithmic rarely disconnects and when it does it recovers faster than any other feed I've used (CQG, Zenfire) which is great for risk control. Never used IQ Feed yet and on NT platform.
) I didn't want to create a new thread because of such question. 
