Internet speed with VPN

[DineshR]

Hello,

 

I have read in several posts on this topic that VPN increases internet speed. I have a 50Mbps/10Mbps 3BB internet connection and I have checked it's speed over several months and have noted good consistency in speed domestically i.e. with Thailand based servers. I always get the advertised 50Mbps speed whether I test with speedtest.net or with testmy.net. Recently, because I needed a US based IP in order to take advantage of the full functionality of my Apple TV box, I bought myself a Linksys router with ExpressVPN capability and subscribed for the ExpressVPN service - after doing some research to determine which would be a good VPN service - scanning most of the posts on this forum as well as googling VPN reviews. I have noticed that when I check the speed with VPN disabled, a connection to a server in the US might give you say 10Mbps but when I turn on VPN, the speed drops to around 3 to 4 MBps. 

 

Does anyone else have this experience and is this what I should expect ? Or is there something I should be doing to get a faster speed ?

 

My current set up includes the 3BB modem router with the Linksys 1200 AC WRT router (flashed with ExpressVPN firmware). The Linksys router is connected to the 3BB router via a cable from one of the 4 ethernet ports on the 3BB router to the internet port on the Linksys router. It took me a while to figure out how to make this work but I finally got it working. The IP on the 3BB router is 192.168.1.1. while the IP on the Linksys router is 192.168.42.1. I have connected the Apple TV box using both the wifi from the Linksys router (both 2.4 as well as 5GHz) and to see if it made any difference, I also tried a powerline adapter and connected the Apple TV to the internet via it's ethernet connection. In all cases, the speed was much slower when VPN was enabled to when it was disabled.

 

Any thoughts and inputs would be much appreciated. Thank you.

[ukrules]

The slowness is due to the connection from Thailand to the US.

 

If however you were to connect to a datacenter in Singapore you will find that it's much faster.

 

Lets take it a stage further, if after connecting to Singapore you then had your own VPN server configured to connect to another server in the US it would provide you with a US IP via a relatively fast Thailand - Singapore link and a Singapore - US link which is faster than Thailand - the US.

 

Whatever you do it won't be the same as the speed inside Thailand.

 

So you either need to start renting servers and daisy chaining VPN connections / tunnels or put up with it.

 

[RichCor]

While employing a VPN 'can' have the effect of increasing the response speed to overseas sites, most of the time utilizing a VPN will slow your connection as the overhead required for data packets to be encrypted and encapsulated or unencapsulated and de-encrypted adds time to the overall response.  The speed gained by some VPN users to overseas sites is primarily due to forcing a longer but faster route be taken to reach and receive a response (possibly avoiding Thailand-based International Internet Gateway congestion).

 

"Routing" and "Peering" connection of the chosen VPN Host to the rest of the Internet will also have an effect on how well your overseas Internet connection response speed occurs. 

 

You may find some websites respond much quicker, while reaching a similar website will have a worse response time.

[DineshR]

Thank you both for your comments. Much appreciated. Will do some research and study on how to use a fast external site such as Singapore to get to the US. 

[Pib]

The problem could be your ISP (True) or your VPN provider (ExpressVPN).   When I was on True DOCSIS/cable 15Mb plan using a VPN connection definitely helped to increase my speed to the U.S.  But after I switched to AIS Fibre 100Mb it really didn't help....I could get a faster speed via non-VPN in almost all cases.

 

Also, the type of VPN connection being made can make a big difference.  That is, protocol PPTP, L2TP, SSTP, OpenVPN, etc.  

 

And when talking OpenVPN you have OpenVPN UDP and OpenVPN TCP connections....with some ISPs the UPD connection may work the fastest...with other ISPs the TCP connection may work faster.  And with some ISPs OpenVPN may not work very good/fast at all.   When I was with True, OpenVPN UDP or TCP worked good/fast; but with AIS Fibre I can't make a connection to many sites using UDP but I can connect to all sites using TCP.    Also, getting OpenVPN to work properly on some computers/mobile device can be problematic.  

 

But if you have a Windows/Android device you don't even need your VPN service providers app to use VPN....instead, just use a Windows/Android "manual" VPN connection.  I'm sure your VPN service provider has info on how to set a manual connection up....it's easy.   I use VPN periodically on my Windows/Android devices....I do not use my VPN providers app....I just have manual connections setup.   Maybe for Apple based devices you can do something similar....I don't know as I'm a Windows and Android person.

 

Don't know what type of VPN protocol you have been trying....but be sure to try a PPTP connection just in case you were using only OpenVPN which a lot of people seem to like using.

[muratremix]

3bb throttles USA bandwidth along with everything else except Singapore and Asia.

use singapore vpn.

[muratremix]

some vpn providers have virtual location.

eg. singapore --> usa.

so you connect to singapore server, but get an USA IP for unblocking usa content.

[miamiman123]

What are good VPN providers for 3bb? 

Thanks.

[uheuhe]

Using VPN will nearly always slow down your Internetspeed.  

If you want to use VPN only to pass geoblocking I would suggest you use Smartdns in stead.  
Using Smartdns you get the highest possible speed between you and the source you choose to see.

 

You can read about it here: www.smartdnsprovider.com

 

 

 

[Dan5]

12 hours ago, muratremix said:

some vpn providers have virtual location.

eg. singapore --> usa.

so you connect to singapore server, but get an USA IP for unblocking usa content.

That's interesting. I'd like to look into it. What VPN services offer this?

[Pib]

45 minutes ago, Dan5 said:

That's interesting. I'd like to look into it. What VPN services offer this?

You'll probably find out many do with some good research. 

 

 And for some folks who only use a VPN providers app to make connections may be connecting to a nearby virtual server vs a server in that far off country...however, they are getting a IP address of that far off country.   And this can make some people think they are getting faster-than-light ping times to say the U.S./Europe when connecting from Thailand (or whatever country) because the VPN server they are really connecting to is "not" in the far off US/Europe location but nearby...and as mentioned, although nearby it's providing a US/Europe/etc., IP address.

 

And virtual servers are also used for some countries that tend to frown or make it difficult to run a VPN Service related business.  For example, with PureVPN they have a Bangkok VPN server which when connection to it gives you a Thailand IP address.  People "outside of Thailand" might need to get a Thailand IP address for some reason....just like many farangs in Thailand need to get an IP address in their home country.  However, PureVPN Bangkok VPN server is "not" in Thailand, it's in Singapore...but it issues out a Thailand IP address. Ditto for a Vietnam VPN connection/IP address. 

 

Virtual VPN servers just come in handy for things like speeding up a connection, not having to deal with VPN business setup pains/restrictions with some countries, etc.   

 

Take a look at this HideMyAss and PureVPN description of Virtual Servers.  Most/all VPN Providers use Virtual server locations whether they tell you are not.

https://support.hidemyass.com/hc/en-us/articles/202722036-What-are-virtual-locations-and-what-do-I-need-them-for-

https://support.purevpn.com/virtual-servers-and-when-you-should-use-them

 

If you ever setup manual VPN connection you can usually tell from the VPN server address if it a virtual server or not by the host name staring with "vl" for virtual location (but this is not always the case...depends on how the VPN Service provider has their servers named).  

 

Like for example from the PureVPN webpage of VPN servers (info needed to setup manual connections when not using their app), you will see the "vl" at the being of numerous server names and the next two letters like if "us" will mean that virtual VPN server is really in the U.S. instead of that far off country like Afghanistan, Algeria, etc.   So instead of the VPN server actually being in Afghanistan or Algeria it really in the U.S. but issuing out a Afghanistan or Algeria IP address.   And I expect where VPN Service Providers decided to setup virtual servers to another country depends on their customer base and/or laws of a country.   The magic virtual servers also allows a VPN service provider to provide service to many, many countries/cities but just dealing with a few virtual server companies who have virtual servers IP addresses for many other countries.  No one should think their VPN Service Provider is really setting up their own VPN servers with there own hardware and personnel in some of the god-forsaken or suppressed freedom countries around the world.

 

 

 

Yea, I expect many VPN users, especially those who strictly use the VPN provider's app for VPN connections, are connecting to virtual servers....virtual servers that are really in another country and not in the country they are being issued an IP address for.

 

 

[Tchooptip]

I have Express VPN, and  yes it slows the speed (test ADSL)

...BUT... sometimes when I look a streaming moovie from a French or a UK website if the streaming is too slow I used EVPN with a location of the Website's country, so French or UK and most of the time the streaming comes back faster.

By the way I never understood exactly why? Anyhow I'm satisfy!

 

[chilli42]

It's not clear to me why you needed to add a router to the router supplied by your service provider.  However, the way you have connected this is doing you no service.  Suggest that when you connect a router to a router you set up and run the service providers router in bridged mode.  This should help speed and avoid issues of duplicate IP

[RichCor]

1 hour ago, chilli42 said:

It's not clear to me why you needed to add a router to the router supplied by your service provider.  However, the way you have connected this is doing you no service.  Suggest that when you connect a router to a router you set up and run the service providers router in bridged mode.  This should help speed and avoid issues of duplicate IP

Some people who want/need concurrent local and VPN'd Internet connectivity will run a dual router setup, with the upstream router providing local Internet connections and offering DMZ to a second router dedicated to VPN connections.

[TallGuyJohninBKK]

On 2/26/2017 at 8:10 PM, Pib said:

The problem could be your ISP (True) or your VPN provider (ExpressVPN).

I''m pretty sure the OP indicated he's using 3BB, not True.

[TallGuyJohninBKK]

I think there's too many broad generalizations being offered above that may or may not be true, depending on a person's particular circumstances, like VPNs will always slow down your connection speeds.

 

To the contrary, I've had both True and 3BB internet for my ISPs over a period of years. And, during that time, I've consistently gotten much faster international connections to the U.S. by using different VPN providers than I would get to the same destinations using True or 3BB alone. I know that because I've done extensive, repeated speed testing on multiple PCs and multiple configurations over a long period of time.

 

Likewise, when people complain about getting speed drops with VPN services, they're likely using the OpenVPN protocol that a lot of VPN services offer as their default setup. OpenVPN is a more secure, more encrypted protocol, which is great if your objective is privacy and security. But if your objective is faster video streaming rates, then you don't want to be using Open VPN and would be much better off using less encrypted, faster VPN protocols like PPTP or L2TP.

 

Also, over the months and years here, there's been a lot of forum member feedback about using VPNs with various Thai ISPs. And based on that feedback, it appears pretty certain that True and 3BB customers typically can benefit quite a bit on their international connections using a good quality and properly configured VPN. But on the flip side, users of AIS's new fiber service don't seem to gain much benefit at all. So like many things, the devil is in your details.

 

Then as others have mentioned above, there are a lot of other potential factors: different VPN services have different quality and configurations of their networks that certainly can affect performance. I've tried and dropped several supposedly well-reviewed VPN services because, at least for me here in Thailand, they gave lousy performance. But other services I've tried and kept, provide very substantial speed improvements over my ISPs alone.

[DineshR]

Thank you all for your very helpful comments. My apologies for not getting back earlier but I've spent the last full day and a half running a whole gamut of speed tests in various configurations ( using the VPN router, using a vpn app on the local device such as an android tv box and using a smart dns on the apple tv box and android tv box ) and using different speed test software ( ookla speedtest, testmy.net, dslreports/speedtest).

 

I should mention what started my journey on this. Late last year, I heard rumors of Truevisions cancelling HBO along with other channels and I then decided I had had enough with TrueVisions and I was going to give it up after seeing True slowly whittle down their offerings over a three year period without informing their customers as to what they were doing and without changing their price structure. You should know that to the day (Jan 31) I cancelled True, they had not even informed me in any way as to the changes and I read of the changes only through the news or Thaivisa.

 

So I got a few things - a true visions box (only a one time cost - 1090 baht - for the box with no recurring monthly charges) from 7-11 that allows the wife to watch her favorite Thai channels, an apple tv (for me to watch movies and some US channels) and an android box to watch movies. Then I needed to make all this work. And that's what got me started on this.

 

Someone asked earlier why I am using 2 routers .... when I first got the apple TV box, I did a free trial with a smartdns service that another member mentioned above called unblockus and I did get it to work on the apple stuff such as movies and music through itunes. But where I ran into problems was with trying to watch CNN and CNBC through the apple tv because I would get messages saying I was out of the US even though I was using this smartdns service (as an aside, you need an active cable or satellite TV subscription in the US in order to make this work). The next logical step was to try a true VPN service and I settled on express vpn after doing as extensive a review as I could. Express VPN, and I suspect all other VPN services, allow you to manually configure most devices to use their service and apple tv was supported this way as well. This meant I did not have to use a VPN router and could rely on my existing router and I only made changes to the apple tv box. I tried this manual configuration and I could never get it to work ( I have a 3rd gen apple TV) even after multiple 'calls' with express vpn technical staff (this is a painful process because you can't really call them and you have to have this discussion over a chat line which can get really tiring). I finally threw the towel in on this approach and decided to go with a separate VPN router. I didn't want to mess around with my 3BB router, fearing I would corrupt it and have problems with it. I also run my wireless camera security system using wifi from the 3BB router and didn't want to disturb that set up. A 2nd router for VPN was the preferred solution for me and that's how I ended up with a VPN router.

 

I'm not very technical and wanted a solution that would be plug and play and a router with built in VPN functionality was what I needed after much googling. And Lazada had the Linksys 1200ACWRT which I learned could be easily flashed with the express VPN firmware. I followed the steps needed to flash this firmware and made sure I could do this before plunging ahead and buying the router.

 

Once I got the router, flashing it was easy enough. However, it took me a while to figure out how to connect 2 routers together and after much frustration got it going. Now I had both the apple tv and the android box set up with wifi through the vpn router. The good news was that everything worked like a charm. I could view CNN and CNBC via the apple tv without any hassles, and could watch movies via the android box without any problems - HD quality without buffering issues.

 

Several days later, I noticed that the connection wasn't as speedy as I had originally experienced it. This is when I started checking the speed and to summarize, here are my takeaways after all the testing.

 

1. I originally had both the apple tv and the android box connected to the vpn network via wifi. I tried both the 5 Ghz and 2.4 Ghz channels - and for some reason, the 5 Ghz channel worked better.  Both the boxes are about 6 m from the router through 2 walls. I was able to get better uninterrupted viewing on the 5 GHz channel. But this was still not good enough. So I bought a powerline adapter set and used that to create a hardwired ethernet connection to both the boxes. Here I definitely got much better performance.

 

2. I checked the raw speed out of the router with an ethernet cable to a laptop and checked speed with and without vpn enabled.

 

VPN disabled

 

The ookla speedtest gave me the highest readings to a server in London from 20 - 33 Mbps down and 7 - 9 Mbps up. Testmy.net gave a readings from 1.8 Mbps to 4.3 Mbps down and 3.0 - 3.4 mbps up while DSL reports gave me a reading from 6.88 - 8.23 Mbps down and 3.18 - 4.09 Mbps up. The DSL reports speedtest gave me more consistent readings than the other 2 tests - so I continued further testing only using dsl reports.

 

3. As an aside, the ExpressVpn app on the laptop allows you to run a speedtest across all their servers in the world at one go.

 

I had been regularly running this test almost every 2 or 3 days and put it on a spreadsheet to see if I could pick out a few good servers that had consistently good speed performance. And I was looking only at sites in Europe  or the US though I did keep data on Asian sites as well. (This file is available to anyone that wants to see it). Based on that data, there was one site that performed consistently well in the UK and a couple of sites that did well in the US though the US sites had longer ping times. So for further testing, I used that one site in the UK and one site in the US.

 

4. For London, with VPN disabled and through the powerline adapter, I was able to get 2.61 Mbps to 8.22 Mbps down and 2.28 to 4.66 Mbps up.

 

For San Jose, with VPN disabled, I got 4.26 - 6.76 Mbps down and 2.7 - 4.02 Mbps up.

 

5. With VPN enabled, I got the following. This I measured on the Android box with a browser and dslreports. However, for some strange reason, once I selected the London site and then when I went to change the test server location to San Jose, the site would not let me deselect the London site. This is kind of where I stopped testing. But my London results are as follows. Don't have San Jose results just yet. To be done next after I figure out how to deselect the London site and replace with the San Jose site.

 

London 2.66 - 4.60 down and 2.40 - 4.44 Mbps up

 

Interestingly, not much less than the VPN disabled numbers above in (4).

 

6. For now, the apple TV works fine when set to a VPN server in the US and the android box works fine when set to the London server - and by fine, I mean, no interrupted video viewing.

 

My next step is to run the San Jose test through the box and see what I get.

 

A request - to - TallGuyJohninBKK - can you share the VPNs you use in Thailand that gave you the substantial speed improvements. I'd like to try those out as well. Every little bit of perfromance I can squeeze out of my connection will help.

 

Thanks again to everyone for all your help.

 

 

 

[muratremix]

Only vpn that'll improve your speed will reside in Singapore.

True online used to give good speeds against USA with or without vpn too but singapore is always a sure bet.

[DineshR]

Thank you muratremix ! I will try the Singapore servers as well.

[TallGuyJohninBKK]

19 hours ago, muratremix said:

Only vpn that'll improve your speed will reside in Singapore.

 

That's not been my experience with both True and 3BB.

 

Their direct international speeds to places in the U.S. are relatively slow, and with several of the VPNs I've used including the one I'm using now, my VPN connections to the U.S. also get very substantial speed improvements over the comparable ISP only connections.

 

But it is true, Singapore connections generally will do quite well for Thailand locations because of the proximity and good interconnectivity between the two. And that's fine, unless you need a U.S. IP address.  I've used virtual U.S. servers based in Singapore before also, and they often worked fine, but my current VPN provider was but no longer is providing that, so I'm using U.S. located servers, and they do very well in terms of speed, despite the obviously longer ping times.

 

[muratremix]

If you want a better speed, you shall get a vps at digitalocean singapore node for 5 usd / month and install openvpn with easy to use scripts like openvpn nyr in github etc.

 

then, you'll get better speed everywhere else.

[TallGuyJohninBKK]

27 minutes ago, muratremix said:

If you want a better speed, you shall get a vps at digitalocean singapore node for 5 usd / month and install openvpn with easy to use scripts like openvpn nyr in github etc.

 

then, you'll get better speed everywhere else.

I know you've been flogging that one service repeatedly here, presumably because you use it and like it. And I have no problem with that.

 

But not everybody wants to, so to speak, "roll their own" VPN service. A lot of folks would rather, and are content to, find a good commercial VPN provider than works for them and leave the technical stuff to others.

 

[muratremix]

5 minutes ago, TallGuyJohninBKK said:

I know you've been flogging that one service repeatedly here, presumably because you use it and like it. And I have no problem with that.

 

But not everybody wants to, so to speak, "roll their own" VPN service. A lot of folks would rather, and are content to, find a good commercial VPN provider than works for them and leave the technical stuff to others.

 

Public shared vpn services could not guarantee bandwidth on singapore. When we had 15-20 or 30 mbit max speed in previous years, that wasn't a problem. But now people getting 50-100 and even 200 mbit/s speeds. I doubt any commercial vpn provider with singapore servers can sustain this much bandwidth.

 

Installing openvpn only takes a few minutes and after you get certificate (client.ovpn file) from your vps server, you're done. No need to deal with it again, like ever.

[TallGuyJohninBKK]

31 minutes ago, muratremix said:

Public shared vpn services could not guarantee bandwidth on singapore. When we had 15-20 or 30 mbit max speed in previous years, that wasn't a problem. But now people getting 50-100 and even 200 mbit/s speeds. I doubt any commercial vpn provider with singapore servers can sustain this much bandwidth.

 

 

My VPN seems to work just fine (and as I've mentioned before, consistently faster than direct/no VPN international connections). The two tests both used 100 MB file download samples:

 

3BB 200 Mbps fiber service, with my VPN-PPTP connection to their Singapore server:

 

3BB 200 Mbps fiber service direct - no VPN

 

BTW, those are both with Ethernet connections to my 3BB fiber router at home. If I was using wifi, even AC wifi, the speeds for both would be somewhat slower.

 

[KylieLopez]

On 2/28/2017 at 2:39 PM, DineshR said:

Thank you muratremix ! I will try the Singapore servers as well.

You can try purevpn they have servers in Singapore and its based in Hong Kong https://www.purevpn.com/singapore-vpn-service.php

Affordable price and unbeatable speed, perfect for privacy and encryption, works in all things like streaming & Torrenting. 

[Sambora]

Using SmartDNSProxy (Singapore DNS) on my AppleTV trying to stream german/international channels through Zattoo app... the stream almost never starts, and if it does, it lasts for only 5 minutes before it goes into a dead loop.

 

comparing this to an OpenVPN connection to Singapore server which at the same time provides SmartDNS I am watching Zattoo without any interruptions.

 

time to get myself a vpn router?

[TallGuyJohninBKK]

33 minutes ago, Sambora said:

Using SmartDNSProxy (Singapore DNS) on my AppleTV trying to stream german/international channels through Zattoo app... the stream almost never starts, and if it does, it lasts for only 5 minutes before it goes into a dead loop.

 

comparing this to an OpenVPN connection to Singapore server which at the same time provides SmartDNS I am watching Zattoo without any interruptions.

 

time to get myself a vpn router?

 

I don't know the Apple platform. But I was reading a similar topic on an expat forum on Facebook the other day where Apple TV owners, if I understood them right, were insisting they were able to view U.S. content on their Apple TVs without using a VPN merely by making sure the region setting in the Apple TV device was set to U.S.  But that sounds rather unlikely to me...

 

[DineshR]

It's true that you can use Apple TV to view content from Apple without using VPN because you have to pay to watch movies on Itunes. Apple doesn't really care where you are consuming content they sell. However, where Apple TV does require a VPN with a US IP is in those cases where you want to watch live TV streams such as CNN and CNBC. Without a US IP, those apps on Apple TV don't work.

[Mich28]

Another problem may consist in the vpn server load. Usually I’ve discovered this factor using free vpns. This can happen if there are a lot of customers connected to the picked server simultaneously. The problem may be fixed by connecting to a different server from the same country. In addition, I highly recommend to pay for services and avoid free vpns (here I’ve read more pros&cons https://www.bestvpnrating.com/blog/5-reasons-why-you-should-use-paid-vpn).

[SooKee]

Part of my concerns with VPNs (other than the fact I hardly even need one) is that many devices have no local configuration if you want to use a VPN service so it has to be router based which will require the purchase of a router AND a VPN service.  

 

About the only thing I've considered a VPN for is to access UK/US catalogue of Netflix / Amazon Video but these providers are on crusade to lock down their regional content by blocking VPN access and I can't help thinking that if they can block 95% of the VPNs that used to work, it won't be long before they get round to blocking the few providers that still seem to be able to get through.  I'd hate that to happen the week or even month after I'd paid for all I need (that's around 10,000 baht for a GOOD quality router and around 3,500 baht for an annual VPN subscription) as, while it won't break the bank, it's money down the drain for an ultimately pointless venture.  

 

I'm also anti cluttering up the home with box after box and would hate to have to keep the AIS supplied router (HG180v2) in bridge mode then have to connect the new router to that via the WAN port.  AIS does offer some superior routers via their online shop including Nighthawk D7800 or the D-LINK DIR-895, I've yet to get a reply from them as to whether they will work with the Fibre Home package directly and without my needing to keep the HG180v2.  

 

The final, and probably most important issue for me, is that I'm not keen to shell out 10,000 baht on the basis of the rave reviews and advertised 'outstanding' performance of these routers given that I fell for that crap with the Apple Airport Extreme (5th Gen) vs the ISP provided router in Malaysia.  How excited I was to unbox it and set it up and look forward to my boosted wifi performance only for it to be a TOTAL anti-climax with performance barely any better (and in some cases worse!!!!) than the freebie it had just replaced. And that was after extensive analysis regarding ideal placement and channel selecting.  Talk about buyer remorse.  Absolute <deleted> TBH.  So I've certainly adopted a 'once bitten, twice shy' approach to routers and their much hyped ability to out-perform others.  Don't plan on getting burned again!!!!