After months of less than startling performance I recently tested the speed of my home connection - with a free online service Speedtest.net - with startling if unsurprising results.
I got the lead on the test site from my wife who saw an article while surfing on a leading New Zealand news website www.nzherald.co.nz about Kiwi ISP’s over-promising and under-delivering – sounds familiar doesn’t it!
Apparently when the newspaper ran a survey of their readers it highlighted that in the Shaky Isles a large number of subscribers are getting a lot less than they pay for, with some forking out for so-called broadband and being lumbered with not much more than dial-up pace.
They asked their readers to select an Auckland server; for my test I used Sydney. Of course, internet speed is affected by the amount of online traffic, so connection speed will always slow down at busy times of the day, like late afternoon, but will conversely be fastest at non-peak times like early morning 3.00am. For a locally based test you can use www.zdnet.com.au/broadband/speedtest.htm which, incidentally, confirmed my New Zealand result of 214 kps.
When it comes to defining download speeds it can be very confusing for non-techos but the OECD are quoted, see www.oecd.org/sti/ict/broadband as saying: "Broadband connections included in OECD data must have download speeds equal to or faster than 256 kps".
Both results confirmed my worst fears. For the record I immediately emailed my ISP’s support line with details of approximate distance from the closest enabled exchange and the set-up (wireless hub etc) and queried what speed I should reasonably expect – a week later I’m still waiting for a reply.
Many members of the local chapter of the Australian Computer Society I know consider that when using a fibre optic based network anything below two megabits cannot be considered broadband - and they’re talking bi-directional, two megabits up and down.
To muddy the waters further one NZ Wireless provider claimed to deliver speeds up to 40 times faster than dial-up, but only 18.2 per cent of its customers logged were in fact in the 1500kb-3Mb range when tested.
The survey's stand-outs included TelstraClear, with its Wellington-region cable service, and Tauranga-based Netsmart - both of these companies had the bulk of their subscribers over the 1.5Mb/s mark and many over the 3Mb mark. Whether these two Kiwi ‘stars’ offered business grade is a further complication since it has in fact been possible with some broadband connections in Australia to obtain intermittent very high speed up to 24 Mps (Telstra’s much hyped but now discontinued ADSL2 service) if your office was located closer than 2 km from their exchange – and uptime was not guaranteed.
The Federal Government has always been very selective when it has made statements about the state of broadband services in this country and Minister for Communications Senator Helen Coonan has steadfastly claimed that very fast broadband is actually available for those who want it.
All I can say is, if you are located in a major capital city, and situated close to an exchange, and cost is not a factor, then fast broadband is available. And for the rest of us: well we’re in the same boat as the Kiwis no matter what the pollies say.
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Opening the window to your business
Sutherland Shire Council is hosting the fourth annual business conference on Wednesday 5th September, at Tradies Club, Gymea.
This is the major business event in southern Sydney for the NSW DSRD's Small Business September calendar.
The conference will be presented in a relaxed, business-friendly format, with informative sessions for attendees to reflect on critical aspects of their business. The line-up of special presenters promises to be both entertaining and inspiring.
For more information. Click here-> | 
