You are correct, AB will only save number of bars specified
in the 
    database settings.
I save tick data of few future contracts. To keep the 
    whole
3 months of history I had to set that number to 1,000,000!
(you 
    need to edit the registry to allow that setting). This
results in a data 
    file that can reach 30 MB per symbol.
I do not think there is a penalty 
    in performance once the
symbol is loaded. There seems to be s long 
    time-lapse when
changing symbols.
Joseph 
    Biran
____________________________________________
-----Original 
    Message-----
From: amibroker@xxxxxxxxxps.com
[mailto:amibroker@xxxxxxxxxps.com] 
    On Behalf Of Barry
Scarborough
Sent: Thursday, July 31, 2008 9:09 
    PM
To: amibroker@xxxxxxxxxps.com
Subject: 
    [amibroker] Database settings and the amount of
data saved
I set 
    up a 5 second database today and let the number of
bars default 
to 
    1000, duh. I am trying to build a long term database for
"forward" 
    
testing using BarReplay. When I tried to use the data there
wasn't 
    too 
much there, duh again. I changed the database settings to
200000, 
    84 
days, but when I hit OK it tells me there will be
performance 
    
degradation. I didn't think AB loaded all the bars but only
enough to 
    
fill the indicators. Why are we getting this message, what
does it 
    
really mean and why does the database default to so small a
number of 
    
bars? 
I had wondered why I kept losing data. It seems AB 
    truncates
the data 
in the database to the number of bars specified on 
    the
database 
settings. Is that the max size of the database? I 
    always
thought, 
especially with the message about performance, that 
    this was
the number 
of bars that would be loaded. I did not know it 
    was the max
database 
size and that AB would truncate the data when 
    that number
was exceeded. 
Before it does that there should be some 
    warning message
that the data 
will be truncated unless the database 
    size is changed. Data
is 
important and should not simply be deleted. 
    It would be much
clearer if 
the parameter said database size per 
    symbol. That would give
us a clue 
as to what is happening when we 
    start losing data. And maybe
the 
message text should be changed if 
    the size of the database
does not 
impact performance.
What 
    needs to be done so I can archive lots of data but not
impact 
    
performance? I surely don't want it to load a 100,000 or a
million 
    bars 
when I open a symbol. With terabyte hard drives archiving
lots 
    of data 
is pretty cheap these days. Back in the early days of AB 
    40
GB drives 
were standard. No longer. 
    
Barry
------------------------------------
Please 
    note that this group is for discussion between users
only.
To get 
    support from AmiBroker please send an e-mail directly
to 
SUPPORT {at} 
    amibroker.com
For NEW RELEASE ANNOUNCEMENTS and other news always 
    check
DEVLOG:
http://www.amibroker.com/devlog/
For 
    other support material please check also:
http://www.amibroker.com/support.html
Yahoo! 
    Groups Links