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A couple of items to consider....
1) what is your computer's overall CPU Utilization % ?
2) what % of your CPU is taken-up by NT8 ?
3) have you removed all unwanted processes like the Windows search indexer ?
These can really bog down a system.
4) consider elevating the execution priority of NT8 from Normal to Above Normal or High.
In my experience an accumulation of old drawings ( that often aren't even on your screen and sometimes never will be again ) are one of the biggest hand brakes in Ninjatrader.
Also, leaving a workspace running over multiple trading sessions doesn't seem to remove bars/candles ( price data ) that goes outside your chosen look-back period ( i.e. 1000 bars or 3 days, etc ) and you get extra work happening that isn't needed.
And as mentioned by many, even just one badly written indicator on a high data rate chart can screw you.
That all being said, I upgraded to Ryzen 5950x ( 32 threads) with 32gb, good mid-range to higher-range GPU and high performance M.2 drive and have way fewer problems now.
...IF I am diligent with housekeeping my workspace. Because it can still happen if I'm lazy about that. But it now feels like it's partly my fault and not as regular as it was with my older set-up.
Yep, that's right. I myself notice sometimes when I double click on a trend line, that the window is full of no longer used drawing tools. Good point!
There are now plenty of housecleaning tips on this thread to inform many. Perhaps there are more to come.
For me, when I built a new Ryzen chipped PC and use it only for trading and ABSOLUTELY nothing else, I don't have any issues. I do some housekeeping now and then. I use my old trading PC for browsing/emails etc. No more frustrations.
On a side note, my Aussie Wifey's PC is a refurbished Dell Optiplex ( which we bought about 4 years ago) with a speed of about 2200. She runs 2 monitors and has numerous tabs running on both. We just do house keeping on it periodically and she never has any freezing or lag problems. And all that for under 200 dollars usd. It's funny how well that it actually works.
Thanks for all the replies. My micro strategy I run all the time has 12 NT8 built in indicators. That chart is always fine. Crosshair is good. Everything is good. It is in minutes. It is the mini ES chart that gets laggy. I am running ticks, tick counter, 2 different second entry indicators, EMA's, Tickhunter, and an inside bar painter. Everything is on On Bar Close or Price Close, except the tick counter. When I do the db deletes, and restart, it is okay. Sometimes it will last for hours, sometimes less. I do use this pc for work, so there is a lot of other stuff on all the time... excel, photoshop, email, ton of google tabs, ship station, discord, etc. BUT I have come from TOS. Been using that platform for about 8 months. You can have a gaggle of crap, endless charts, news, lists, indicators, scans, etc, etc, going on all at once and it never even flinches. That is with all my other programs going and never restarting or shutting off this computer. THEN coming over to NT8, I have 2 charts open and it slows to a crawl or worse. I am only using templates btw. I attached a pic of about 4 hours today. At this point, the lag is back, crosshair is jittery, button clicks laggy. It is barely bearable for trading right now. I have performed pretty much all the things suggested here. Right after that, it is fine. Few hours later it is bogged down. I have no problem with upgrading PC and can make it dedicated to trading only. Just want to make sure that is what I need. Thanks again!
Only running windows anti-virus. Here is a pic of the CPU utilization from just now. Currently have NT8 auto strategy and the one ESmini chart open. I have disabled indexing and set NT8 to high. cpu-util
If you're using photoshop while you're trading, it's going to slow everything down. Try putting photoshop on another computer for a while and see if there's a difference.
My system is similar to yours and it runs way more charts and indicators on a update-by tick basis. I don't have lagging issues when trading live. The lag I get is when I load and exit, which doesn't bother me.
I run on an SSD though.
I would suggest loading the indicators one by one, and then adding them one by one to see which is the one causing the issue.
It could also be your strategy.
Alternatively, you can run on alternative instruments like MES, NQ or MNQ and see if the same things happen.
This sort of problem will require process of elimination, I'll also second opinion of loading indicators one by one.
Sometimes we mistakenly make some minor errors in program that can lead to loops which can be memory and processing power hogs, you will need to find out which of your indicators has that problem,
Meanwhile, if you happen to have access to other better computer, you can also test run there.
Agree with both these posts, which may have been made by others, but deserve to be made again.
There were changes made when NT8 was designed that require particular programming practices. Failure by programmers to comply, both with indicators and strategies, caused serious issues in the early days, and in some cases these issues may persist today. Some indicators/strategies may not be fully compliant even now, or they may just be badly coded. You can't know if this is the case for you without elimination and step by step re-introduction of every indicator or strategy that did not come direct from NinjaTrader and that is not the current version of an NT-supplied indicator/strategy. You also need to test things like the number of charts, amount of data and number of workspaces you are running, by elimination and step by step re-introduction.
So, the best technique is to:
1. Get back to a bare-bones, current installation of NT, running nothing at all except one chart with nothing but price on it and relatively little data.
2. One at a time, re-introduce indicators/strategies and run each for a good period of time to see if the one you're testing causes problems. Let the run time be consistent with how long it normally takes for your issues to appear. You will need to be patient with this, particularly since many/most/maybe all will be fine. But if you don't test, you don't know. (A complication is that the issue may be caused by having too many things running for your machine, which also should be tested by adding them in cumulatively to see what happens.)
3. Do essentially the same test procedure while gradually introducing more resources, like more charts, workspaces, more days of data, etc.
If you're lucky, you'll find a problem quickly. If not, you will not. But there is no other reliable way to know.
Or, of course, you could just spend the bucks and get a new PC . The problem is that you won't know in advance whether this will solve it, and you will have spent the money. There are still members of this forum who have problems with NT8 not running well, but there are a whole lot more who don't, judging by the fact that many use it and few complain. But the number of users with issues is not zero, which is real and is troubling. (Replacing the whole PC is, of course, an additional elimination test, just an expensive one.)
Good luck. Sorry that you're one of the ones with issues. But elimination and step-by-step re-introduction is the only way to find what is going on, once you have done the other things recommended by other NT8 users.
Bob.
When one door closes, another opens.
-- Cervantes, Don Quixote
. The problem is that you won't know in advance whether this will solve it, and you will have spent the money. There are still members of this forum who have problems with NT8 not running well, but there are a whole lot more who don't, judging by the fact that many use it and few complain. But the number of users with issues is not zero, which is real and is troubling. (Replacing the whole PC is, of course, an additional elimination test, just an expensive one.)