How much faster is MT5?

[TradeChaser]

I am getting further into building dash boards that iterate through several custom indicators. This is naturally very taxing on MT4. I have heard that MT5 is faster and accesses more cores in your computer's processer. I will admit, I have a loose idea why that is beneficial, but do not know if that applies to what I am looking to do.

The average dashboard I build that checks logic behind custom indicators will push the MT4 client to 20%+ cpu usage.

Will MT5 load dashboards that go through all pairs and timeframes (essentially iterating numerous times through arrays by pair and timeframe), check numerous indicator statuses, etc. and apply conditional OBJPROPs faster than MT4 will, ideally without freezing? Or is this simply a process that is inherently slow and will freeze any client terminal?

 

[TradeChaser]

ADDED:

To perhaps provide even better context to my question, I have a lot of custom indicator's that I have created. they probably could be better and are likely inefficient - maybe that is my real problem although I doubt it, because the MT4 freezes happens even when it's just built-in indicators as well.

I know MT5 will be a learning curveball thrown my way, so I am polling anyone reading as to whether MT5's processing power is such that it's worth learning to code for Dashboard creation and not trading (I am in US and I don't believe I can use it in this way).

 

[Enivid]

MT5 won't be faster for a dashboard indicator. MT5 is still very poor at working with many chart objects at once.

 

[Ak04]

Found it to be slow so far with the scripts.
The most important thing is your ping speeds.
Usually around 100 ms is pretty slow.

 

[Ak04]

MT5 won't be faster for a dashboard indicator. MT5 is still very poor at working with many chart objects at once.

Envid, is it normal for mt5 to get hung up and not display ONE chart out of all the other pairs?

 

[Enivid]

Found it to be slow so far with the scripts.
The most important thing is your ping speeds.
Usually around 100 ms is pretty slow.

The ping doesn't depend on whether it is MT4 or MT5. The ping depends on the connection between you and the broker.

 

[Enivid]

Envid, is it normal for mt5 to get hung up and not display ONE chart out of all the other pairs?

This usually happens when you have more than one account in the platform. Some symbols are from one account, others are from the other. When you are connected to one account, you cannot load charts of the other symbols, and vice versa.

 

[Ak04]

The ping doesn't depend on whether it is MT4 or MT5. The ping depends on the connection between you and the broker.

That's exactly what I meant. I'm using a broker that has the slowest servers and it's a real nuisance....among other "things".

 

[Ak04]

This usually happens when you have more than one account in the platform. Some symbols are from one account, others are from the other. When you are connected to one account, you cannot load charts of the other symbols, and vice versa.

Hmmm..not what I was experiencing. It was weird, only on that particular chart. I keep thinking it's a stupid script that's bogging down mt5.

I had this happen, quite a few times with 4, when I have an indicator that starts a process that's maybe too heavy on memory at that moment and it freezes up.

I don't know, I think mt5 is not as good a product as the company wants to portray...just my personal opinion.

 

[HeavenLeighGill]

So did you decide to continue on with MT4?

 

[Ak04]

So did you decide to continue on with MT4?

No, this particular broker "off-shore" I was studying, only offered the 5 platform. Mt5 just seems a bit buggy and the options of add-ons out there are pretty limited for what I need even the simple stuff. Not worth paying to get it done either.

I decided to I was done with the broker for now after the same usual routine I was noticing.

 

[Glossy]

I use MT4 and I don't understand why people need MT5.

 

[najafi]

After demo trading with MT4 for almost 2 years, I switched to MT5 and am happy with this new version.
I think MT5 is far better than MT4 because it utilizes multi-thread features that employ more than 1 CPU core, which leads to a faster experience.

So, I can't understand why people don't upgrade their MetaTrader!

 

[Mikhail_trade]

I have used both MT4 and MT5 as well and prefer 5 for reasons I would have to explain in paragraph form (realizing most wouldn't care to read). To each their own.

 

[heggna]

I'd like to revive this conversation because I too am considering a transition to MT5 for a similar reason: Essentially, I run about 5 different MT4 terminals on one computer, each from a different broker. Each terminal has up to 15 charts open, and each chart has multiple objects and indicators. As you can imagine, the terminals are quite sluggish when I manipulate the charts.

My current processor is a 2017 model. I initially theorized that if I migrate my MT4 terminals to a newer system with a faster processor, that speed and performance might improve. But MT4 was designed for old processors, and does not take full advantage of multiple cores. (MT4 was first launched in 2005, and Intel's first multi-core processor was launched in 2006.)

So I am considering migrating my entire setup to MT5, which is supposed to be more efficient in its use of modern-day computing resources. If I do make the transition, this will mean enduring a learning curve, and rewriting my indicators and scripts. I am wondering if it is worth the trouble.

My question is pretty much the same as that of the original poster: Can I expect substantial improvement in speed and performance, with a decrease in sluggishness, if I transition to MT5? Is it worth it to learn MQL5 and rewrite all my indicators and scripts?

 

[Enivid]

I'd like to revive this conversation because I too am considering a transition to MT5 for a similar reason: Essentially, I run about 5 different MT4 terminals on one computer, each from a different broker. Each terminal has up to 15 charts open, and each chart has multiple objects and indicators. As you can imagine, the terminals are quite sluggish when I manipulate the charts.

My current processor is a 2017 model. I initially theorized that if I migrate my MT4 terminals to a newer system with a faster processor, that speed and performance might improve. But MT4 was designed for old processors, and does not take full advantage of multiple cores. (MT4 was first launched in 2005, and Intel's first multi-core processor was launched in 2006.)

So I am considering migrating my entire setup to MT5, which is supposed to be more efficient in its use of modern-day computing resources. If I do make the transition, this will mean enduring a learning curve, and rewriting my indicators and scripts. I am wondering if it is worth the trouble.

My question is pretty much the same as that of the original poster: Can I expect substantial improvement in speed and performance, with a decrease in sluggishness, if I transition to MT5? Is it worth it to learn MQL5 and rewrite all my indicators and scripts?

MT5 is much faster than MT4 when it comes to a lot of computation, for example when optimizing expert advisors. However, MT5 is slower than MT4 when it comes to work with the chart objects. For example, if you put a few thousand chart objects on an MT4 chart and the same number on an MT5 one, the former will be more responsive than the latter. I'm not sure why that happens, but if your trading routine involves operating with a large number of chart objects, I wouldn't expect much from moving to MT5.

 

[heggna]

Thanks @Enivid. That's very helpful info. I do indeed often have quite a few objects on my charts. On average maybe 8-15 objects. And there are multiple charts.

Do you have an opinion on what the effect of multiple indicators is, on both terminals? For example, on average I have about 4-6 indicators on each chart. I am working on combining all indicators into one using multiple buffers in one indicators. I'm doing this because I read somewhere that in MT4 each chart has one thread dedicated to all indicators, instead of a separate thread for each indicator. I surmised that this could be the cause of the sluggishness in my terminals. Is my info and thinking correct? Also, does MT5 create a separate thread for each indicator? Will it be less sluggish on this account if there are multiple indicators on one chart?

 

[Enivid]

Thanks @Enivid. That's very helpful info. I do indeed often have quite a few objects on my charts. On average maybe 8-15 objects. And there are multiple charts.

Do you have an opinion on what the effect of multiple indicators is, on both terminals? For example, on average I have about 4-6 indicators on each chart. I am working on combining all indicators into one using multiple buffers in one indicators. I'm doing this because I read somewhere that in MT4 each chart has one thread dedicated to all indicators, instead of a separate thread for each indicator. I surmised that this could be the cause of the sluggishness in my terminals. Is my info and thinking correct? Also, does MT5 create a separate thread for each indicator? Will it be less sluggish on this account if there are multiple indicators on one chart?

That number of chart objects shouldn't be causing any problems in MT5. As for MT5 parallelism, you can read this article. It explains this quite well:
https://www.mql5.com/en/articles/197

 

[heggna]

@Enivid Thanks. I actually read and saved that article yesterday. But I missed the part about threads. It looks like even MT5 uses a single thread for all indicators on any one chart. I guess I'll stick to MT4 and make the most of it. For the time being, it doesn't seem worth it to make the switch to MT5. It has many features, but the new features are not useful to my use-cases in particular.

 

[jim_]

The speed of MT5 can vary depending on various factors such as hardware, internet connection, and specific tasks being performed. However, generally, MT5 is known for being faster than its predecessor, MT4, due to improvements in algorithms and optimization. If you have specific performance requirements or benchmarks in mind, it would be helpful to test MT5 in your specific use case to accurately measure its speed compared to other platforms.