Install and run AetherHFT

1 · Install and activate

1. Prepare your server

   Windows 10/11 (64-bit) or Windows Server 2019, 2022 or 2025 — no separate .NET installation is needed. For the best fills, choose a VPS in the same region as your broker’s trade server. Connect with Remote Desktop (on a Mac: Windows App from the App Store).

2. Find your server’s public IP

   On the VPS, open PowerShell and run:

   curl.exe -4 ifconfig.me

   — or read it in your VPS provider’s panel. That is the IP you send us when you buy. It must be the public IP, not a 10.x or 192.168.x address.

3. Get the installer

   When your licence is active, the installer arrives in your chat with @AetherHFTbot, with its SHA-256. Open Telegram on the VPS, or copy the file across in your Remote Desktop session. Optional — check that the file is genuine; the result must equal the SHA-256 we sent:

   Get-FileHash .\AetherHFT-Setup-*.exe -Algorithm SHA256

4. Install and start

   Run the installer (if Windows shows Windows protected your PC, choose More info → Run anyway), click Install, then start AetherHFT from the desktop shortcut. It activates by itself on your licensed IP — nothing to paste. The Logs tab shows [LICENCE] Activated on IP … (licensed until …).

   Seeing Activation required? Compare the IP on that screen with the one you sent us, and send a screenshot to @AetherHFTbot.

2 · Set up safely

5. Choose a preset and set your limits

   On Strategy & Risk, pick a built-in preset (Standard is recommended), set the daily drawdown kill switch and your broker’s real commission, and press Apply tunings. Settings are saved and restored after a restart. The complete settings reference is in the user guide (PDF).

6. Add your MT4 or MT5 broker account

   On the Slow Brokers tab — the broker accounts AetherHFT trades on — choose MetaTrader 4 or MetaTrader 5 (the platform your broker opened the account on) and type the server name exactly as your broker gives it (for example YourBroker-MT5 Demo), or just the company name. AetherHFT finds the server, measures every access point from your VPS and selects the fastest. Your broker gave you an IP or host instead? Enter it under Or enter an IP / host[:port] yourself.

   Enter the login and the master password (an investor password cannot trade), press Test login & find gold symbol, check the symbol and lot size, then save. Start with a demo account: every connected account with Active ticked receives real orders.

7. Connect your market data

   On the Fast Feeds tab, click Add Fast Feed and pick a template — an MT4/MT5 account at a fast broker, a major crypto venue, a custom JSON WebSocket, a raw TCP feed or FIX 4.4 — or keep the free built-in source. One feed is the lead, and every broker is compared with it unless you give that broker a feed of its own (see optional features). A feed only reads prices: it can never place an order.

3 · Validate and operate

Measure first, then trade — on demo until the numbers make sense.

8. Read the latency analytics

   The Lead vs broker column on the Dashboard shows, for each broker, whether its feed moves first and by how many milliseconds — AHEAD is what AetherHFT needs; BEHIND means signals would be stale. It shows measuring until a few dozen price moves have been compared. The optional Lead guard pauses new entries on any broker whose feed is behind.

9. Start, monitor and stop

   Start engine connects your data and every account with Active ticked; the header shows how many accounts receive orders. Untick Active to stop one account. Stop engine closes AetherHFT’s open positions and disconnects everything; Emergency Close All on the Positions tab closes positions immediately.

10. Review the trade journal

    The Positions tab lists open trades and recently closed ones with profit, commission, hold time and close reason. Every closed trade — including the ones your broker closes itself — is written to logs\trades_YYYYMMDD.csv with its real profit and the full round-trip commission, as on your broker statement.

4 · Optional features

All of these stay off until you switch them on; without them AetherHFT trades exactly as described above.

A fast feed for each broker New in 4.7

In the Fast feed column on the Slow Brokers tab, pick a feed for any account — or Default to follow the lead. A feed’s prices reach only the accounts that use it, and the Fast Feeds tab shows which accounts use each feed (Used by). When an account switches feed, its baseline starts fresh, so the normal price difference between two feeds is never read as a signal. A late feed pauses new entries only on its own accounts; open trades are still managed.

Saved presets per account

Save tuned settings under a name on the Strategy & Risk tab, and give each account its own preset in the Preset column on the Slow Brokers tab.

Hide order comments

Tick Order Comments: Hide on the Strategy & Risk tab and press Apply tunings. From the next order on, AetherHFT sends its orders with no comment, so neither MetaTrader nor your broker shows “AetherHFT” on them; it still recognises its own trades by their magic number. It hides the label only — your broker still sees every order.

Two-leg lock

Opens a hedged pair — a buy on one account and a sell on another, or both legs on one account that allows hedging — and manages it as one lock: it opens only when every lock account is connected and Active, and it always closes as a whole. Each trade pays the spread twice and both legs pay overnight swap, so test it on a demo account first.

5 · Before you go live

• Run on a demo account first and judge the results in the trade journal over at least two weeks.
• Confirm with your broker, in writing, that this trading style is permitted on your account.
• Tick Active only on the accounts that should trade; check lot sizes and the daily drawdown limit.
• Make sure the latency analytics show each traded broker’s feed AHEAD of that broker.

6 · Updates and your licence

• Updates. Every release in your year appears inside the app with its release notes. One click installs it — checked against the signed release — and AetherHFT restarts with your settings kept, typically in under 20 seconds.
• Licence checks. AetherHFT re-checks its licence every 30 minutes. A network problem never stops it: it keeps working for up to 72 hours if our licence server cannot be reached.
• Changing servers. Send the new VPS’s public IP in your chat with @AetherHFTbot and our team moves the licence.
• Renewal. Nothing renews automatically. Renew in the chat when you choose; a renewal adds a year on top of the time you have left.
• Refunds. Within 7 days of payment, for any reason — see the refund policy.