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Speeding up NinjaTrader with a RAM drive (ramdisk)
Using LinkShellExtension, you can create symbolic links to files as well as folders.
So you could move your heavily used file onto the RAM disk, then create a symbolic link to it in its original location, which is the directory where you want your trading platform to think it should be. (The link source is the RAM drive, and you drop a symbolic link into the original directory).
Even if you don't use a RAM disk or an SSD, just having these files on their own hard disk might help performance by reducing I/O conflicts.
Disk caching will also help. I have been using Windows Ready Boost for months now without problems.
I'm surprised that there does not seem to be much activity in this thread. You get a big improvement in performance by making such simple changes, without having to buy anything. On Windows machines, this idea should work with any trading platform that has historical data stored in non volatile memory.
In the C:\Program Files (x86)\Ninjatrader7\db folder there are two text files, Instrument and Instrument.srv.
Moving these to the RAM disk, and creating symbolic links to them from their original location, seems to accelerate Ninjatrader startup.
Backup these files, and know how to get back to your original setup. If these files are damaged, Ninjatrader will not start.
If your system physical disk (usually Disk 0) is an HDD, but you also have one or more additional physical disks, set the RAMDisk to back up to a non-system disk so that creating the RAM disk backup images will not be competing for I/O with processes that use Disk 0.
Then you can set the RAMDisk to back up more often, since the backups will be faster and have less of an effect on other processes.
Latest test: Loaded nine complex workspaces, saved all of them, and restarted Ninjatrader with Kinetick set to connect automatically. Reload takes about three minutes.
Zondor be possible, you make a small tutorial to install the Ram. Not sure how to do.
My platform freezes when it enters high volume, but put on (true) many indicators and remove many templates that I use, but still freezing.
Also takes several minutes to open the platform.
@Felix trader, Ninjatrader is probably freezing because you are using poorly coded indicators that waste computer resources. The stupid, lazy coding methods that are so popular result in a condition that is like traveling 500 miles to end up across the street.
That's the first thing that needs to be fixed.
The RAMDisk setup makes Ninjatrader start up faster by letting the charts backfill from RAM rather than from a hard disk. There may be some improvement in real time performance after charts have loaded, but I don't think that will solve your problem.
I plugged in an old iron and there was a bright flash and loud pop. I thought that my PC would be safe since I have a UPS, but that PC had shut down. On restarting the machine, the NinjaTrader content on my RAM disk was lost and the RAM disk backup file was empty.
I was disappointed that the backup created by the RAM disk software was no good, but I had a separate backup and that saved the day.
Bear in mind that a backup of your C: drive will probably only backup the links on the C: drive to the RAM disk (R: ), but not the directories and files on R:. It depends on how your backup software treats the link to the content on the RAM drive. Windows Backup does not follow the link, so it will backup the link, but not the data on the R: drive. If Windows Backup is set to backup C: and R:, then the content on both drives will be backed up.
My RAM disk saves its contents to c:\ramdisk\nt.img and that is included in my C: drive backup. I was able to restore an old img file to recover the R: drive content, but it would be better to backup R: directly, since the img file needs to be inactive to ensure a clean backup.
Computer was locking up to the extent that could only be turned off with the power switch. Seemed to happen when doing a lot of web browsing with Ninja open. Browsers would lock up first, then Ninja, then Windows would freeze. This was after using Dataram RAMDisk for about two weeks with no problems until then.
Switched to Softperfect RAMDisk, which is working OK so far. This one also allows persistent RAM disk saved to an image during regular intervals and upon shutdown.
It's very annoying if an important system software fails. I don't thrust any non-commercial software product in this environment. I'm with SuperSpeed RAMDisk Pro since several years at different systems in different environments (currently not using Ninja with that, because currently i've no speed issues at all). The product range of SuperSpeed is very broad and their have a deep knowledge how to do the things right. Many large companies use their software and they can't afford to release an unstable product.
