Edit: It seems starting with build 482 the makers of MT4 (MetaQuotes) decided to put the platform update code right in the MT4 executable program itself so the platform now updates itself AUTOMATICALLY. I find this to be a bad idea and no doubt many of you do as well. I can go into a few reasons why, but I shall save that for later. As far as I know there is no way to disable this and prevent the platform from automatically updating (and thus restarting) itself. If I find something I will post an update here or in a new post.
Hello fellow traders.
I’m not sure how many of you have wondered if there is a way to get rid of MT4’s automatic auto update notification, but if you wish to permanently disable it I have found a solution. The most common reason I can think of why anyone would wish to do this is to ensure that your EA or backtesting platform is always running a specific version of MT4. This could be necessary for compatibility reasons or maybe you just don’t want to be bothered every time you load up the platform.
There is of course a downside to disabling the auto update feature. The main negative point is that you’ll never receive the latest bug fixes and security fixes that get incorporated into newer version of MT4. If you stick with one version forever you’ll have to live with all the bugs and potential problems that particular version of MT4 has.
But if this is something you are sure you wish to do, here is how you do it:
1) Open up the folder where you installed the MetaTrader 4 platform (typically it is located in c:\program files\)
2) Find a file called LiveUpdate.exe
3) Rename that file. It can be any name just make sure you don’t rename it to something you won’t recognize later. For example, I renamed mine to “LiveUpdate.exe-” (without the quotes obviously)
This will permanently disable MT4’s auto -update feature. Later on if you wish to upgrade the platform to the latest version available from your broker just rename the file back to LiveUpdate.exe and restart the platform.
That should do it!
Alan out.
Cheers!
like the post, will definitely bookmark it.
How can we disable the auto update on build 509 as every time there would be an auto update the MT4 would be restarted which is a problem for some clients with running EAs
Ash I’ve got some bad news. It seems with build 500 and up you can’t disable autoupdate any more. I will do some research and see if there is some way but right now the auto update code is built right into the main mt4 executable (program). This sucks and I wish MetaQuotes did not do this. I much prefer the old way (liveupdate.exe)