Wired up and ready for action

By JUHA SAARINEN

Wired Country's plan to bring high-speed internet access to a larger chunk of Auckland is gaining momentum.

Already a fibre-network operator in Franklin District, Wired Country is making a wireless broadband service run in the licensed 3.5GHz (gigahertz) band available to people within a 12km radius of the Sky Tower.

Later in the year the greater Auckland region will be covered up to Rodney, as Wired Country fulfils the obligations of its Project Probe tender with the Government.

Although unwilling to quote customer numbers, Wired Country chief executive Neil Simmonds expected "record weeks every week from now on" in terms of sign-ups.

Figures quoted in the media point to Wired Country having around 3000 customers.

Internet providers ihug, Iconz, The Packing Shed and Concept Net are so far selling the service. In Hamilton, Wave Internet and PC Connect provide residential connections.

Simmonds said it gave customers the option of fast internet access instead of just dial-up, together with a telephone service, for roughly the same price. They could also have "multiple retailers" on the service, choosing one provider for data and another one for telephone.

The wireless service is aimed at residential and business users, with different service alternatives and features available.

Ihug's general manager of sales and marketing, Duncan Shand, said ihug's residential plans started at $44.95 a month. This buys 256Kbps (kilobits per second) speed for up- and downloads, and a monthly data volume of 6.5 gigabytes of international traffic, with national traffic free. When the cap is reached, the service throttles down to dial-up speeds, but there are no excess data charges.

Business plans ranging from 256Kbps to five megabits per second and priced between $49 and $399 a month are also available from ihug, which has slightly better performance than residential plans.

Installation cost for both services is $100, with a roof-top aerial that customers connect to their computers or networks through an Ethernet network interface.

Shand said the provider was trying out internet telephone service and faxing over the wireless connection. But no date had been set for providing the telephone service to all wireless customers, he said.

Ihug already has 35,000 toll-call customers using its telephone services for long-distance calls.

Graphcam Services, a computer- assisted design and manufacturing specialist in Papakura, switched to Wired Country wireless six weeks ago.

"We are finding it more reliable than Jetstream," said manager Peter Wallace.

Ardmore Flying School general manager Craig Hunter said he was "rapt" with the new link. It had been running for a month and, apart from one outage lasting four hours on a Sunday, it had been reliable.

Who gets it

* Available within a 12km radius of the Sky Tower (which you must be able to see), Counties Manukau and Franklin District, from Manurewa to just south of Tuakau, and reaching to Waiuku in the west and Drury, Ramarama and Bombay in the east. Also available in Hamilton if you can see Waikato Hospital.

* The service comes in varying speeds, starting at 256Kbps up to 2Mbps alternatives. Business plans can be as fast as 5Mbps.

* Pricing starts at $45 a month for 256 Kbps and 6.5 gigabyte of international traffic and no excess charges through ihug. Wave Internet offers the same speed but 5GB international traffic for $60 a month. Iconz charges $85 a month for the 256Kbps service, flat rate. A 6GB account at the same speed costs $65 a month at The Packing Shed, with a 10c a megabyte excess data charge.

* Installation costs between $80 to $100 depending on internet provider, and includes aerial and equipment for the connection.