This July we celebrate our 20th year providing solutions to our customers.  Thank you for your support!

Our company was recently approved by Apple to become an authorized business agent. This allows us the ability to sell the complete Apple product line through our online Apple store. We have always supported Apple hardware, provided technical support, networking, and consulting to our Apple customer base. This is a natural extension to that commitment, allowing us to be fully involved with our customers’ Apple hardware, software, and support needs.

In a continued effort to bring high-speed broadband Internet services to the businesses and residents of Chesterfield county CTSI is now offering this unique service in the Chesterfield courthouse area. Speeds for this service rival other broadband technologies such as DSL, but the service is available in a part of the county where DSL is not available. Service plans and equipment will vary depending on your needs and distance from our POP. Please contact us at 804-768-6707 for more information about this exciting new service.

Due to unresolvable issues with our telephone service provider along with historical service issues, we have decided to eliminate our Virginia dial-up network and consolidate all of our dial-up accounts onto our nationwide network. We feel that this is the best solution for providing our customers with the best quality service available, and at the same time freeing the time of our staff to pursue customer service and new opportunities. We are excited about the transition and hope that our customers will be as well. There will be no changes to customers’ e-mail addresses, and there will not be an increase in rates at this time either. Our Richmond customers will now enjoy the flexibility to access their account from POPs all around the country, a feature not available in the past. Customers will be receiving instructions by mail for the changes they will need to make on their computer in order to continue using the service. We encourage customers that have any questions to contact us by email at support@ctsi.net. Thank you for your business and we look forward to a brighter future.

April 24 – May 1, 2002

CTSI owners Bryan & Tonya Caudle were invited to participate in disaster relief efforts in New York. During the week we were there, we participated in providing humanitarian support to the workers at the Staten Island Landfill site, where debris from the World Trade Center site is being sifted for forensic evidence. It was a monumental effort and we were privileged to participate. For more information on disaster relief efforts that are supported by CTSI, visit http://www.namb.net/dr or click on the About Us link at the top of your screen.

As a part of our ongoing process to improve service and quality, we are pleased to announce the completion of several key upgrades that have been in the works for the past several months. First, the replacement of our core router which has about 10 times the capacity of our old core router has been completed. In addition, we have doubled the amount of bandwidth available on our primary backbone connections giving room for additional high-speed services, increased speed for existing users, and additional redundancy in case of network outages. Second, we have completed the migration to the latest RedHat Linux 7.1 & 7.0 operation systems on all of our primary servers. These upgrades allow for increased capabilities, performance, and stability as well as provide increased security for users and data. A new T1 cross-connect facility has also been installed, allowing for fast turn-up of new T1’s as well as providing redundant paths for quick troubleshooting and problem isolation. Also, some new anti-spam features have been enabled on our mail servers to further limit the amount of abusive email coming into our network. With the recent opening of our new sales office near Chesterfield Courthouse, we have expanded our infrastructure further to provide interoffice communications between our office and our datacenter as well as we are able to provide services from our new office that may reduce costs for some customers in the southern Chesterfield area. Finally, our nationwide services have been expanded further with the addition of 2 new network backbones to choose from, giving us the ability to provide services from over 4,000 POP’s throughout North America. We believe that these improvements and expansions will work to improve service quality, availability, and value to our customers and potential clients and we welcome your comments and suggestions.

DSL Service Now Available
We have completed our equipment and service installation to allow us to begin offering high-speed DSL Internet access to area homes & businesses. You will find complete information about the services available, pricing, and availability by visiting our Internet Services page. If you have further questions, or would like to order service, please contact us by telephone at 804-768-6707, or by email.

CTS signs DSL agreement with Bell Atlantic
We have chosen to partner with Bell Atlantic in order to be able to provide cost-effective, high speed ADSL Internet service to Richmond area homes and businesses. This partnership allows us to be your single point of contact for ordering and maintaining your ADSL service. We have also chosen Cisco Systems as our partner for providing our hardware to interface with Bell’s ATM network in order to provide Internet service over their DSL lines. Cisco will also be providing caching hardware that we will use to accelerate all web access for ADSL, and our other dial-up and dedicated connection customers as well, making this addition a benefit to all CTSI customers. We expect to be able to offer ADSL services within the next 30 days, and will be making a formal service and pricing announcement shortly.

CTS Unveils New Web Site
In an effort to improve our service levels to our customers, and to provide timely information about our products and services, we have completely redesigned our web site. Among some of the improvements we have made are online shopping, online account management tools, dial-up number locator, product and service pricing and information, trouble reporting & technical support, easier navigation, and much more. Please feel free to explore our site and send us your feedback by choosing the contact us button on the left side of the screen.

In an ongoing effort to improve stability, performance, and scalability of our network, we are announcing the completion of 2 key upgrades. First, we have completed the installation of additional bandwidth for our backbone connection in Richmond, VA. This upgrades constitutes 6 times more bandwidth than our previous connectivity. Secondly, we have upgraded our core ethernet switch platform giving us additional port capacity along with a 2x increase in packet forwarding capacity. We are confident that these improvements will improve the performance that our users experience as well as provide capacity for our future growth and expanded service offerings. If you have any questions regarding these changes, please feel free to contact our president and director of network operations at bcaudle@ctsi.net.

A major step towards completing our DSL service offerings was getting the authorization to sell the hardware required to interface the customer’s computer or network to the ADSL lines provided by the telephone company. This was accomplished with our approval to sell the 3Com broadband product line. The 3Com product line includes the small office/home office router OfficeConnect 810 which is similar to the Cisco ADSL product we already had available. 3Com also brings a internal and external ADSL “modem” to our product offering, making single PC connections in small offices or home computers easy. These cost-effective products deliver superior performance and compatibility, and are backed be 3Com’s support programs. More information on the modem products can be found at 3Com’s HomeConnect site and info on the routers is at 3Com OfficeConnect site. To purchase these products, or find out about products bundled with ADSL service, give us a call. Products can also be purchased online by visiting our DSL Product Catalog.

CTS Adds Nationwide Service
In an ongoing effort to offer the most comlete service possible, we have added nationwide service to our Internet service offering. This will help us to reach areas of Virginia not covered by our own network, plus adds coverage in 45 states. Please see out national network map for details about the coverage area. In the locations covered, we can offer dial-up analog and ISDN connections.

CTS Celebrates 5 years
We want to again thank our customers as we celebrate our 5th anniversary of serving the computer needs of Central Virginia. We appreciate your support during our first 5 years, and look forward to the future.

CTS Joins BBB
Thanks to our outstanding service and customer satisfaction, we were asked in May to join the Central Virginia Better Business Bureau. Our mission is to continue to provide excellence in Information Technology solutions and strive for ongoing improvement in customer support.

CTS Offers FrontPage support
We now offer Microsoft Front Page support with our business web hosting accounts. Developers can now host their Front Page sites here, and there is no additional cost for this feature.