[alphanumerik]

Thanks for the pm sent, I cldn't reply becos of pc.

[alphanumerik]

1scape wrote:

Check your inbox

Thanks for the pm

[onizuka3]

still got surfshark 0.80 promo?

[xiaofan]

purevpnas China server is apparently not good based on my testing.

Another VPN vendor openly advertising for China servers to go into China for China contents (bypass geo-blocking) is Ivacy.
https://www.ivacy.com/vpn-servers/china-vpn/

Ivacy has offers now, 5 years for US$30 and life time for US$40 with NAT Firewall add-on.
https://stacksocial.com/sales/ivacy-...r-subscription

https://stacksocial.com/sales/ivacy-...subscription-5

It had the US$30 life time offer but now sold out.

Any Ivacy user here?

[t258jgn]

Any gd vpn for nVidia Shield TV?

[stiwipl]

xiaofan wrote:

Yes 12VPN is also recommended by the author of tipsforchina.com for China GFW bypass. But his comments say that 12VPN is more targeting mainland China users and not that good for privacy due to the lack of no log policy.

https://www.tipsforchina.com/mobile/...a.html#6_12VPN

Astrill used to rank very high in the list of VPN vendors. Once upon a time it was also the No 1 choices for unblock China GFW but then was heavily targeted by Chinese Authority and then not working any more. Now it disappeared from the list of top VPNs from various websites.
[...]

You rely too much on the blogs and what those websites recommend, I don't. I rely on my personal and others experience directly with the mentioned VPNs. Just think twice why you think those websites rank some VPNs higher than the others? And this guy from tipsofchina, which I admit has a useful blog (if you know how to read these blogs...), his rank could easily change daily depending if the authorities decided to "switch off" the lights or not.

Your list of 14 VPNs is pointless, "worth looking at". These are not girls we are talking about here but personal experiences with VPNs users have. You have to stop blindly following VPN ranking websites, as in majority they know nothing, apart from how to earn affiliate commission.

Speaking of which, if you would dig a bit, you would know why Astrill has disappeared from the blogs and ranking websites. But yes, you won't find this information there I am afraid. They had affiliate program before which they have decided to stop at one point. Angry "commissioners" (read: VPN blogs) have decided to take them off, because no money no honey. It could be that Astrill, after revamping their website, has brought back the affiliate plan in place but the trust has already been damaged. If you dig even deeper you will learn that people in China are still saying that nothing works better than Astrill.

t258jgn wrote:

Any gd vpn for nVidia Shield TV?

Astrill. Reason is because they have OpenWeb protocol on their AndroidTV, which won't slow down the CPU like traditional OpenVPN offered by majority of VPNs. Alternatively a provider with SS proxy (like 12 VPN) and official SS Android client.

[xiaofan]

t258jgn wrote:

Any gd vpn for nVidia Shield TV?

Shield TV runs Android TV OS and many well-known VPN vendors have apps on the Google Play Store of Android TV OS.

So it depends on what you need. If it is for Netflix unblock, then Surfshark and Windscribe are of good value based on the feedbacks from this forum thread.

[xiaofan]

stiwipl wrote:

You rely too much on the blogs and what those websites recommend, I don't. I rely on my personal and others experience directly with the mentioned VPNs. Just think twice why you think those websites rank some VPNs higher than the others? And this guy from tipsofchina, which I admit has a useful blog (if you know how to read these blogs...), his rank could easily change daily depending if the authorities decided to "switch off" the lights or not.

Your list of 14 VPNs is pointless, "worth looking at".
...
Speaking of which, if you would dig a bit, you would know why Astrill has disappeared from the blogs and ranking websites.
...
If you dig even deeper you will learn that people in China are still saying that nothing works better than Astrill.

Point taken.

My main interests are going into China for China contents and bypass China GFW. I do have first hands experiences in these two use cases.

As for other streaming contents like bypassing Netflix geo-blcking, this forum provides good first hand experiences and test data. And I also have first hands experiences with some US/UK/HK contents.

I understand the websites have affiliate programs. But the tipsforchina website does have good test data and I have sources in China who give me feedbacks on China related VPN and SS providers.

I do not really blindly follow the ranking websites in reality. In fact many website lists Nord VPN as No 1 or No 2 but apparently the feedbacks here say otherwise. Surfshark is a rising star and indeed the feedbacks here are positive.

As for Astrill, unfortunately it is seldom mentioned in this forum recently and my China source told me it did not work well at the time I asked.

Your assertion that nothing works better than Astrill in China is not in line with my observations. Apparently none of the well-known VPN vendors work well consistently. So they are adopting SS or similar. I mentioned this fact in my posts.

[xiaofan]

stiwipl wrote:

Your list of 14 VPNs is pointless, "worth looking at". These are not girls we are talking about here but personal experiences with VPNs users have. You have to stop blindly following VPN ranking websites, as in majority they know nothing, apart from how to earn affiliate commission.

That post is just a starting point and I will add more short summary with more inputs from the users her and elsewhere.

It may be useless for experienced users but may still be useful for inexperienced users.

[sparco13]

is the surfshark 0.80 promo code still available?

[ycse88]

Anyone can pm about the $0.80 surfshark promo?
Thank you very much!

[Pathfinder]

pjs wrote:

How to get this deal?

Or any promotion on Windscribe?

TIA

Yes, the last I checked, it's still available.

Sent from Samsung SM-N975F using GAGT

[bodohboy]

xiaofan wrote:

Are you running the ExpressVPN OpenVPN client under Asus with Asus stock firmware? Or are you running customized ExpressVPN Firmware on the Asus? I tend to believe the proprietary ExpressVPN firmware may have better performance but may not have all the features of Asus/Merlin FW.

ExpressVPN router firmware.
https://www.expressvpn.com/support/v...-routers-asus/

It has the per device settings you want. But not so sure if your router is supported or not.

Yeap I am running OpenVPN client as my ASUS router(RT-AC2600) is not one of the listed router to run the ExpressVPN firmware.

Read through the thread and know that Charlie bro and others are using the AC86U perharps I should get that but it also is not listed to run ExpressVPN firmware. Will that be an issue?

[xiaofan]

bodohboy wrote:

Yeap I am running OpenVPN client as my ASUS router(RT-AC2600) is not one of the listed router to run the ExpressVPN firmware.

Read through the thread and know that Charlie bro and others are using the AC86U perharps I should get that but it also is not listed to run ExpressVPN firmware. Will that be an issue?

Asus RT-AC86U is a very good router and has good performance for VPN.

No need to run the ExpressVPN firmware which has limited router feature. The experts here seem to lean towards Merlin firmware for the Asus RT-AC86U.

[xiaofan]

xiaofan wrote:

purevpnas China server is apparently not good based on my testing.

Another VPN vendor openly advertising for China servers to go into China for China contents (bypass geo-blocking) is Ivacy.
https://www.ivacy.com/vpn-servers/china-vpn/

Ivacy has offers now, 5 years for US$30 and life time for US$40 with NAT Firewall add-on.
https://stacksocial.com/sales/ivacy-...r-subscription

https://stacksocial.com/sales/ivacy-...subscription-5

It had the US$30 life time offer but now sold out.

Any Ivacy user here?

It is tempatating to go into this deal as I'd like to have a two-in-one solution to go into China for geo-block contents and go out of China (to bypass China GFW).

But then I think over it and unlikely the China servers will be reliable since they are simply not authorized by the Chinese authority. So in the end it is still better to use the dedicated VPN like Transocks and SpeedIn which is said to have been authorized by the Chinese authority to provide the services to mainly overseas Chinese to access contents in China.

So in the end I will give IVacy offer a pass.

Still being a Singapore based company, IVacy seems to have good Singapore/Malaysia servers so maybe overseas Singaporean/Malaysian may want to try it for Singapore/Malaysia contents.