Haha yep we've all been there before, I was one that tried to learn it all on my own and that's very difficult at the start. It is daunting, it will take you months to even realise just how much you don't know and what you need to learn .
I have a couple of screens so I have the broker page + charts open at the same time, so technically no slower than using the ASB pages as normal. Everyone is a bit different how they trade, if you are trying to be a scalper or something, you are definitely at a big disadvantage using it going up against the Aussies (you'd be broke rather quickly scalping with ASB's fess anyway!).
For me, most of the trades I make are on stocks I've come across before and done some research on. Sometimes ones I've looked up on the night before or before the open, others I just know well because they are "good" trading stocks and the pop up so often. I try to be prepared beforehand, so if something moves, ideally I will already have a strategy in mind and with price targets for buying and selling; then I can just focus on executing the trades. It will sound like a lot, but this is just the work some put in to try and get an edge. There are those rare days where something is going gangbusters and I will just buy a stock without nothing anything other than the ticker, and that's where seconds count and ASB will not be ideal for sure.
At this point I've just accepted there is no perfect trading platform and they all have some weakness, just a matter of making the best of what you have access to. Even when I had access to a much better platform (it has shut down now) it did not suddenly make me a better trader. Frankly it made little difference to my gains or losses. That's not to stay I still wouldn't give an arm & a leg for something like iress.
And happy to help, being locked down... it gives a good distraction to stop me climbing the walls. You are actually helping me.
.
