Excel hangs with MT4 DDE Link

I have a position sizing spreadsheet that uses DDE links to MT4 to calculate the position size for different account value, risk% and stop value.

I've used this quite successfully on and off for several years, with a variety of different MT4 downloads. Now I'm finding that when this spreadsheet tries to update the DDE links, it just hangs Excel...presumably because it can't find the MT4 DDE server. I have the DDE server enabled in MT4 and the spreadsheet uses the standard syntax eg =MT4|BID!EURUSD.

So something seems to have changed either on the MS side or the MT4 side and I can't figure out what.

Any ideas?

I'm using: MT4 build 220, Excel 2003(11.8237.8221) SP3 and Vista Ultimate

and I'm having the same trouble

I'm also having a similar issue within XP sp3, after an upgrade to MT4 v224. Oddly, one broker's MT4 seems to be the only one where the DDE functionality is working while 2 others don't seem to have any DDE functionality, meaning when they're running solo, I can't access their DDE data. It's almost as if some brokers seem to be able to turn off DDE functionality within what they will all term v224 of MT4. If anyone knows of a utility that can display all the running DDE servers on an OS, that might help all posters thus far in this thread.

I use the DDE function every day. IBFX, MT4 build 224, XP, Excel 2003 etc. The only time I had a problem, I updated the version of Java I was running, and Excel came back to life (although I have no idea why Java is involved in the DDE function).

Hello!

I am trying to use Excel with mt4 dde to do some calculations on position sizing. the problem is that each time I reference the cell containing the live quote in a formula I get the #VALUE! error message. I tried different sample spreadsheets shared on forums but the problem remains.
I run Excel 2003 and under Win XP.

I would appreciate any help!

I am having similar problems however I am using excel 2007. I am using the general ='MT4'|BID![etc] formulas and have all known excel settings in the right place and have DDE enable on the platform. I keep getting a mixture of N/A, #REF, #VALUE and other errors such as unable to run MT4.exe because one of it components is damaged or missing.

I have tried the help function of my broker but they are no help and there is nothing in any of the MT4 literature which give clear instructions on DDE and excel.

I would be thrilled if someone out there had some ideas!!

Thanks,

Scott

well, I had the same problem with excel 2007 and mt4, plus my broker (ibfx) recently added fifth decimal to bid and ask prices.

The solution is very simple, you have to switch decimal and thousands separators in excel (comma and point symbols). You can do it in excel options, advanced tab. Just uncheck "use system separators" box and switch places for decimal and thousands separators. After that, everything should work just fine.

Really people, when are you going to use separators and SI measurements like the rest of us? This is just confusing and no help file covers this.

Personally, I tried almost all the available solutions on GOOG, yet no success.

But the solution I tried and worked?

Change broker platforms.

IBFX did not connect the DDE for me.
The Alpari UK platform worked just fine.

DDE works now

Im having the same problem too. Seems to work fine with my PFGFX MT4 platform (my demo account) but doesnt work with my live account with ibfx. would really appreciate any suggestions since the price decrepencies between them is wide and i need my spreadsheet to be connected to my live account.

I was able to make it work running the LibreOffice Calc (http://www.libreoffice.org/) instead of MS Excel.

I fixed this problem by setting Excel to run as an administrator.

1. Close the Excel program
2. Right-click on the Excel.exe icon on your desktop
(Windows 7/8 users will need to right-click on the Excel tile; select Open File Location on the bottom bar; then right-click on the icon of the Excel file in the list of files)
3. Click on Properties
4. Click on the Compatibility tab
5. Click Change settings for all users
6. Enable the run this program as an administrator box
7. Click Ok and restart excel.

InvaderZim, Spot on it now works , thank you

HI,

This is not working for me...even the sample DDE file is not opening? Any other suggestion or alternate method get the live feed from MT4?
Any suggestion/ advise much appreciated. (FYI.. I use excel 2010)

Thanks
AC

InvaderZim it works, thanks, also it will work on any program using the dde

To solve this problem, follow the next step, which is to restore the Windows system to the day when Excel worked excellent, for example, two days or a week ago, and you will find that the problem has been solved and this is from my experience for many times.