On the road trading gear

[bruham]

G'day all,

When trading shares i can trade from home or work. Shares seem to be able to be traded anytime that the market is open. There doesn't seem to be any urgency when trading.

But trading CFDs is totally different. I feel one must be at the screen almost constantly.

My question is this. In the car (when on the road) which would be the best equipment to be used for trading. A 13.1 inch laptop computer, or perhaps a bluetooth type organiser ?

My first thought is a laptop, but they could become a nuisance to carry everywhere.
So now to ask you, the experts. what would you people use in this situation ?

bruham.

 

[disarray]

a laptop with wireless broadband will be fine. hook up to the net, go to your trading site, all sorted. if you need to install applications for trading (charting or whatever) then you can do that on the laptop too.

if you have a home pc all set up with everything you need you can use remote access like logmein - for $60 US a year you can just hop on the internet and securely remote access your pc from anywhere.

as a tech support i have to say i hate blackberrys / palm pilots and so on because they are always a bitch to sort out. a decent laptop (toshiba tecra series is solid and reliable) should be no more than $1500 then you can get one of telstras wireless broadband USB modems for $30/month or so. should all be tax deductible.

edit - the whole "in the car" thing, you'll be pulling over to the side of the road to trade yeah?

 

[Whiskers]

as a tech support i have to say i hate blackberrys / palm pilots and so on because they are always a bitch to sort out.

Dissaray, I am contemplating getting a blackberry or similar. When you say they "are always a bitch to sort out" do you mean because of the compactness of the hardware or because the operating systems are relatively new and prone to glitches.

 

[Wysiwyg]

I`m pretty sure that coverage is still limited.To access the internet with a laptop you need to be in the zone.If in the city would be o.k. but not for a country drive.

Speeds while roaming in Australia will be significantly slower than while in the 3 Broadband Zone All About 3 Mobile Broadband coverage.
You'll have to be in the 3 Broadband Zone to pick up 3 Mobile Broadband within your plan allowance. But don't worry, we're in most capital cities and plenty of others places too.

(20-40kbps, or 20-30 times slower than normal).

 

[disarray]

whiskers, my main gripe is that its usually management who weild toys like this and they are usually the biggest whiners with the most grandiose expectations while coupled with the least understanding of technical concepts.

with a blackberry you'll need to sign up with a provider (like telstra) to route your emails which you will need to integrate with your existing email system. if you are just sitting at home popping from your bigpond account then no probs, but once you start needing to integrate into your corporate mail systems then it give me a headache. the more you try and get out of the device then the more levels of complexity you are dealing with and the more likelihood of problems. but if you are just grabbing some mails and doing the odd net check then a blackberry will be fine.

devices are getting smaller and packing more functions into them, but if you are going around using the tiny keypad on your phone to browse the internet while taking calls it begins to reach limitations of usefulness. added to the fact they have a tendency to breed obsessive behaviour (like young people who check for messages every minute) i don't really get into gadgets. don't let my personal prejudices sway you

as for broadband, my grey nomad parents have just finished driving around australia with a bigpond broadband connection and they had adequate coverage through much of the country. if you are near the cities or any kind of population centre then you'll be fine.

 

[stevo]

There are some really lightweight laptops around. Sony make one (Vaio TZ18) that has 32gb flash drive instead of a hard drive, carbon fibre case, 11 inch screen.

But trading whilst on the road!!! I can picture it now - mobile in one hand, laptop on the knees, steering with your elbows.

Or maybe the chauffeur can take over whilst you sit in the back of the Bentley with a big cigar watching the market on a 32" LCD whilst heading for the motor yacht on Sydney Harbour.

I'm off to Europe in December and will take my 12" Dell. But trading minute to minute isn't an option - that's why I don't trade CFD's and run only weekly systems. I really only need to check the market 3 (or maybe 4) times whilst I am away. I don't expect to get wireless broadband in Casablanca but I won't be there that long. I will ditch the SMSF to my brother (it's his money also) and only have the personal portfolio to manage.

Maybe give CFD's a miss whilst you travel? There is nothing worse than trying to trade short term whilst working full time even if you are incredibly well organised.

stevo

 

[nizar]

Or maybe the chauffeur can take over whilst you sit in the back of the Bentley with a big cigar watching the market on a 32" LCD whilst heading for the motor yacht on Sydney Harbour.

Stevo!

I must say I do like your style!

 

[Craton]

Wow man! From a bloke that started trading equities via the phone, then via dialup (modem), boy oh boy technology/IoT has come a long, long way even since these posts were logged however, those of us dwelling/travelling outside of the coast corridors are still stuffed.

In the past, I've missed many a trade opportunity thanks to no connectivity whilst travelling in the outback and in remote/regional areas. It is better nowadays but when there is no Telstra signal what can you do?
Nope, I can't support the cost of satellite broadband for the irregular and unscheduled trips that I need to do in my line of work besides, satellite still doesn't guarantee 100% coverage so this is my one big gripe in that the cost of connectivity, is still way too high.

That being said, I reiterate, wow man, technology/IoT, tablets, smart phones and the like have really changed the way and where we trade for all manner of goods and services. Simply amazing and this is just the tip of the iceberg. Bring it on and the connectivity costs down!