How Many Monitors Do You Need for Trading?

Are you considering setting yourself up as an at-home trader? After all, it’s a great way to get a yearly income with a flexible work style. Regardless of how many monitors you want though, you’ll have to decide on whether you want a laptop or computer for your 6 monitor setup. Check out tradingcomputers.com to view the top devices in the industry that meet all your trading needs.

Calculating your 6 Monitor Setup Needs

The first point to note when considering a multi-monitor setup is the following decisions:

• Develop your workflow
• 4 screens per monitor

Essentially, you’ll need to define what type of trading you want to do with your 6 monitor setup and therefore what kind of graphs and charts. It’s then very simple math. Every monitor, regardless of screen size, holds, on average, 4 charts. So, let’s say you want to track 20 different charts on your multiple monitor setups then you’ll need 4 screens. Don’t forget though that you might also want to keep an eye on your trading platforms and news sources as well as chat and email with your multiple monitor arrangement. You’d be surprised at how quickly you come to the conclusion that a multi-monitor setup is for you.

Trading Workflows and your 6 Monitor Setup

Whilst calculating how many monitors you need based on 4 charts per screen is easy, how do you even come up with the list of charts for your multi-monitor setup? Let’s have a look at the details:

• Trading strategy
• Charts and time frames
• Sources of news

Trading strategy

Clearly, you’ll need to work out if you’re a short-term or longer-term trader. So, are you a day trader or even a scalper who closes their positions every night? Then again, do you prefer trading over weekly time frames? These decisions will help you decide your charts list for your 6 monitor setup. If you’re new to trading, then there are many different platforms where you can follow various courses to learn about the various strategies. Simply email your name, email address and you’ll be on the next webinar in no time.

Charts and time frames

Once you know your time frame, risk appetite, and trading funds, you can determine what kind of information you need to track. You’ll also have to decide on what type of securities you want to trade with your 6 monitor setup. Again, all of these choices will impact the graphs, you monitor. Some traders even get into coding so that they can monitor and predict pricing patterns. In that case, you might want a dedicated display monitor where you can run your codes.

Sources of news

Trading doesn’t just rely on statistics and probabilities. Depending on what type of trading you do, you’ll also have to monitor news sources for any political or macroeconomic impacts. Moreover, you’ll have to operate through brokers and their trading platforms. All of these data sources need space in your 6 monitor setup. By planning ahead though, you can make sure that you get the right amount of screens to cover everything you need to track.

Getting the Right Equipment for Trading

As you can see, determining how many monitors you need all starts with your trading strategy and what information you want to follow. Once you have all that in place, it’s worth reviewing the equipment for your perfect 6 monitor setup:

• Monitors
• Processing Power and Speed
• Graphics Cards or video card

Monitors

Now that you know how many monitors you want, what about what type of screens are best for your multi-monitor setup? Some opt for the larger curved screens but most go for the 23 inch LCD TN panels. These seem to be the optimum resolution per price ratio. Then again, even gamers who need high resolution often choose the lower specification TN panels. That’s because the refresh rates they use are usually too high for the screen resolution to keep up.

Processing Power and Speed

Whether you choose two, three, or 6 monitors, you need a desktop or laptop with enough power and speed. A good rule of thumb is to have at least 16GB or even 32GB of RAM along with a CPU of at least 2.6GHz, usually Intel or AMD. Ideally, if your budget can afford it then 3.8GHz will mean that your computer is that much faster.

When it comes to operating systems though, it doesn’t matter whether you have Mac or Windows 10 because they’re both easy to set up. Although, bear in mind that you’ll need to check the Display port options of your device as well as all your monitors. Having said that, most setups need at least an HDMI but you might also need either a VGA, DVI, and USB ports as well as, of course, one power supply unit.

Graphics Cards

It’s important to remember to check for the specification of your integrated graphics card. Many gamers choose to build their own computers but that’s a little extreme for trading. Nevertheless, a powerful graphics card means that your charts and graphs are updated that much more quickly. That can make all the difference for scalpers who trade in seconds. Simply note that the top brands for graphics cards are Radeon or NVIDIA and are usually specified at 4GB or 6GB.

Parting Words on Trading with a 6 Monitor Setup

How many monitors any trader needs is actually a personal decision based on trading strategy and working style. Once you know your strategy, you can work out how many charts and graphs you need to view on your multi-monitor setup. Then, remember to get the right equipment with the right graphics processing power so that you can actually view the charts in almost real-time. That could make the difference between a loss and again.