Sorry that I don't own MC /EL copy- just gave it a try. Due to pricey, I gave up my tests 3 on MC years ago. As per trading platform and analysis(experiment) I think Matlab is more than enough, you can find pluggin for automated trading with real broker using Matlab. Re MT4, several options for extending this cr@p for testing and debuging the process are on the net now. MT4API for net for single broker solution, NQuotes (C# App) for creating trading apps (EA), trade interceptor for multibrokers...
If you are bigplayer, e.g. institutional man, lots of options are opened. Otherwise, all those toys are too expensive, in terms of cash and/or time (the later seems harder, you know).
G'luck.