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A satellite hook-up. The latency, which is the time it takes for the signal to travel to the satellite and bounce back to earth, renders these connections a bit slow for direct access trading. But, if point-to-point is not available in your area, a satellite hookup is preferable to a dial-up connection. |
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The older, and slower, technology, consisting of a regular telephone line connected to the Internet by modem, with speeds up to 56k. If you are serious about trading, even for only a few trades a month, do not settle for a dial-up connection. They are simply too slow . . . and they crash way too much! |
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Your ISP will publish the connection speed for your connection. You will find that different ISPs will publish different speeds for the same technology. Not every T-1, DSL or Cable connection delivers the same published bandwidth. Check carefully. |
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On top of that, in many cases the connection speed you actually achieve will be slower (less bandwidth) than advertised. As noted above, this can be particularly true with the cable connection, but is also true with all dial-up connections. The "truest" connection speeds are with T-1 and ADSL/DSL. |
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Internet Connection Speed |
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In the past, this was more of a concern because undercapitalized ISPs tried to save money in this area. Today, most established ISPs are connected from their servers to the Internet via T-1 or greater. Be sure your ISP can affirm that all of its servers have T-1 or greater access to the Internet. |
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Communications Redundancy |
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Look for an ISP that has more than one communications "path" from its servers to the Internet. If your ISP only has connections through your phone company and that firm experiences a network outage, you are cooked. Multiple carriers are a must for the ISP you choose. |
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