Some personal experiences sharing, no fancy technology stuffs, just plain actual usage experiences.
Having 3 VPNs (VPTraffic, PIA and Astrill) currently, I personally think Astrill gives the best overall speed for my usage (stream from US & CN). PIA though give 5 connections, but most of the time we'll only be using one. VPNTraffic is just cheap.
For US steam, PIA speedtest normally you'll get lower ping to Singapore, but in actual usage I find Astrill gives better speed from most servers. Like when using XBMC add-on, some US stream servers I find I'm unable to watch 720p during peak hours, but am able to using Astrill. Sometime I even find VPNTraffic better than PIA. PIA seems to work better with putlocker and 180upload.
For China steam, Astrill still can lag during peak hours, but it's better than VPNTraffic. However, I ever managed to dl files with Xunlei VIP boost using VPNTraffic and gotten download speed of 2.5+MB/s. Astrill best CN server is actually proxy via US, which is why the speed is better, their direct CN server CMI. VPNTraffic is direct CN servers, offpeak hour streaming LeTV 720p normally no lag.
Most likely will not renew PIA, will just use Astrill and VPNTraffic as spare.
Which is US$69.95 + US$35 per annual.
Just ordered a cheapo used modified netgear 614v9 (64MB RAM + 8MB Flash) which cost around S$25 shipped. Going to use it with Astrill applets and see how it turns out.