It feels like I poured a chunk of my life in TDS2 and now that I think about it, I guess I really did – I spent the better part of one year with its development. On top of that, some of you spent the past 6 weeks assisting me with the 8 beta iterations it went through while I ironed out all remaining issues and the result is that Tick Data Suite v2 is now ready for public release.
All users are encouraged to update, although TDS v1.x will still be supported until the end of 2016. To update, simply head to the downloads page to get the v2 installer.
Note that this is a free upgrade for all users with an active support plan, so you can use your existing license to install it. If your support plan expired and you’d like to restore it, simply open a ticket in the support section and I will get back to you with instructions on purchasing the $29 update package.
When updating from the old Tick Data Suite, it’s very important to note that everything has been streamlined in the new version and the tick data backtesting process is completely different. Everything is fully integrated and much more intuitive, starting from downloading the data and ending with enabling tick data and activating special backtest configurations in Metatrader 4.
If you’re new to Tick Data Suite v2, I recommend watching the quick start video below, it’s less than 2 minutes in length and it provides a good starting point. Sorry for the large resolution, you’ll want to watch it full screen with HD quality.
If you already have some downloaded tick data on your disk, you can start by importing that. You can read more details about the import process at Importing Dukascopy data downloaded by other applications which also contains a small how-to movie.
Tick Data Suite v2 was rethought and rewritten from scratch and it has a lot of major new features, among which:
* Integrated tick data downloading from Dukascopy as well as TrueFX.
* Direct integration in the MT4 backtest pane.
* Central tick data repository eliminates the need for huge CSV files.
* Tick data is directly fed from the central repository to Metatrader 4, bypassing the need for large FXT files.
* Proprietary data compression engine that beats any commercial compression in both speed and size when it comes to financial data. Together with the other storage features, this saves huge amounts of disk space.
* Data importing from other popular tick data downloading applications.
* MT4-integrated settings dialog allows modification of all backtesting variables.
* Support assistant application makes it easy to open support tickets and attach log files or screenshots.
* All TDS v1.x features are still present, but much easier to use: you can start multiple MT4 instances from the same folder, you can use variable spread, you can simulate slippage and so on.
If you’d like to read more details about what’s new, you can take a look at the Tick Data Suite v2 public beta article.
To wrap up, I’d like to express my thanks to all the users who assisted with the beta testing – your feedback has been invaluable.
And finally, a ton of other new features are planned so stay tuned and expect periodic updates!