Broadband slowest in the deep south

Broadband is slower the further away customers are from Auckland, with Dunedin at the bottom of the heap among the major centres, according to a report released by the Commerce Commission.

The report said broadband speeds had improved 4 per cent during the past three months. It did not take into account the performance of TelstraClear's cable networks, which are used by about 70,000 households in Wellington and Christchurch.

The average Kiwi broadband user got peak download speeds of just over 5 megabits per second. Telecom's performance ranged from 7Mbps in Auckland to just under 5Mbps in Dunedin.

Commerce Commission telecommunications branch director Osmond Borthwick said the study by research firms Epitiro and IDC showed a "lack of sufficient capacity on national and international connections" constrained further improvements.

The Southern Cross Cable, which carries almost all international internet traffic, comes ashore at two sites in Auckland.

Internet content stored on servers overseas typically took at least twice as long to download as content that was stored locally, the report said.

Southern Cross spokesman Ross Pfeffer said the cable had plenty of capacity. "But we are not the people who provide the services." The issue of whether internet providers were buying sufficient international bandwidth was best directed to them.

Telecom home services director Ralph Brayham said Telecom had spent up over the last 12 months on computer systems that cached frequently accessed files on servers in New Zealand, so they download faster.

The commission gave internet providers the thumbs-up for broadband reliability, reporting an average of 14 minutes downtime a month.