Two men charged with the murder of a Helensville drug dealer have made their first court appearance after being arrested at the weekend.

Andrew Parry Nicholson, 24, and 27-year-old man with interim name suppression appeared in North Short District Court on Monday, Radio New Zealand reports.

They have been charged with the murder of Lee McMurdo, 32, whose body was found in the driveway of his Helensville home, north of Auckland, in July, 2011.

The men, who were arrested on Sunday, also face a number of methamphetamine-related charges and will reappear next month.

Last month, a year after the killing, police said they were baffled by the killing of someone they described as a low-level drug dealer.

Mr McMurdo's death had been violent but police are not saying exactly how they think he was killed.

They believed drugs were involved, specifically the drug MDVP, or methylenedioxypyrovalerone, which is an ingredient of the designer drug referred to as "bath salts".

Bath salts have hit worldwide media headlines recently for their supposed link to bizarre psychotic attacks, but the drug is relatively new to New Zealand, police say.