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Server Redundancy and Backup
Ask about server redundancy and backup; that is, the ability of your ISP to give you uninterrupted service even if one or more of its servers "goes down."
Customer Service Staff
Is anybody home? If you have any kind of problem, will someone take care of youright now? You should talk to some existing customers to find out how good your prospective ISP is at solving problems. Remember, to trade you need to be up and connected. "After hours" trading is already a reality, and it soon will become an important part of your trading business. Will your ISP be there for you 24/7?
Price
Forget about it. Price is not an important issue; ISP charges are never that expensive. If you find an ISP with fast connections, layers of redundancy, and a customer service staff that can read your mind, sign up now! It will be more than worth it for your peace of mind and the lack of hassles during the trading day. Remember that just one good fill on one good trade can pay for your monthly ISP charges many times over.
Computer Equipment
Must you have the very latest "Flash Gordon" technology to be competitive in the markets? In a word, no!
In this section, we want to sort out what you really need and should be willing to pay good money for, from the bells and whistles that don't help you one bit as a trader.
Processor Type
Every direct access trading system today runs on an IBM-compatible, Windows-based platform. We have heard rumors of the development of

 
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