Actually, speaking of which. Does anyone know where I can get an MC simulator for cheap? I suppose I could sort of dig one out of open source, but I’ve tried a few and they run too slow.
In order of least cost (and unfortunately, most time):
Most, if not all, programming languages come with a rand() & stat/math libs. So, you could code and optimize one yourself. just kidding…
I’m assuming that you are modeling the problem in an MS Excel spreadsheet, and that using the built-in rand and stat functions are impractical and/or on-sheet simulations are very slooooooooow. If so, your cheapest route would be to use a free add-in, albeit with very limited features, such as:
If you require a large number of variables, availability and ease of choosing the appropriate distribution curve, sampling method, etc. you will need something more powerful (and costly, a few hundred to several thousand+).
Of course, if the problem isn’t modeled correctly, or if the distribution curve doesn’t fit your data set (or the MC outcomes are random and your dataset trends), the simulation won’t be much benefit. Garbage in, garbage out…
