Connecting to the Web via VPN is one of the best way to surf the web anonymously and access to content that are not available (such as Hulu, Pandora) in your country. Hotspot Shield is one of the popular VPN around. It is free and is compatible with Windows and Mac, but it can be slow at times and is filled with advertisements that spoil your browsing experience.
What other choices do you have?
ibVPN offers both free and premium VPN for public use. They give out 30 free VPN accounts every month to their subscribers, and for those who want a faster and less congested connection, can opt to pay a monthly fee for the extra boost.
Unlike Hotspot shield that requires you to install a desktop client, no installation is required to use ibVPN. This makes it compatible with all platforms, even your iDevices and Android phone.
To connect to ibVPN, you will have to configure your network setting for your OS.
Here’s the instructions to configure a Windows 7 machine, Mac machine and iPad/iPhone.
How does ibVPN fare compared to the rest?
Personally, I have not tried all other VPN services, so there is no way for me to compare ibVPN with the rest. Over the few days that I have used ibVPN, it loads pretty quickly. In some instances, some sites are not loaded properly (or can’t be loaded at all), probably because its IP was blocked. When such incidents occurred, switching the VPN server usually help. Other than that, I have no issue in watching videos in Youtube, Hulu or browsing Facebook, Twitter etc.
Here’s a quick comparison of the ping speed between my native connection, ibVPN and HotSpot Shield
| Without VPN | ibVPN | Hotspot Shield | |
| MakeTechEasier.com | 186ms | 186ms | 318ms |
| Hulu | 194ms | 242ms | 276ms |
| Pandora | 201ms | 195ms | 301ms |
| 285ms | 271ms | 284ms | |
| 206ms | 196ms | 335ms | |
| Youtube | 170ms | 232ms | 317ms |
The test was done with a premium VPN account. You can see that the speed is comparable to the native connection and is much faster than Hotspot Shield.
Free Giveaway
You have seen enough, it’s time for our weekly free giveaway. This time, ibVPN has generously sponsored 10 free accounts valid for 3 months. These accounts will have access to US, UK, CA, DE, NL and IE servers.
Here’s how you can participate in the free giveaway:
This giveaway had ended.
Damien Oh started writing tech articles since 2007 and has over 10 years of experience in the tech industry. He is proficient in Windows, Linux, Mac, Android and iOS, and worked as a part time WordPress Developer. He is currently the owner and Editor-in-Chief of Make Tech Easier.
8 comments
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Thank you very much for the giveaway!
I really need this one to allow me access some restricted site specially in the US from my country.
I glad to be share in FB and Twitter:
http://twitter.com/vj_onix/status/26766843833
http://www.facebook.com/#!/vic.limbo?v=wall&story_fbid=150360998338615
Awesome thanks a lot for this chance, i really miss AOL Radio and other stuff, hope to win 1 account.
Good luck to everyone.
https://twitter.com/Shoobis
Thank you so much for the giveaway. I hope I Win. I live in Canada and I can not watch Hulu Videos but with that I can.
I tweeted it: https://twitter.com/#!/user015/status/26786458942
Please follow me on twitter: user015
Please visit my website: www.gregoryhammond.ca
Thanks for the Giveaway. shared it on FB
http://www.facebook.com/Imashwin/posts/157976237557137
hello,
thanking you.
i tweet there
http://twitter.com/GTGT1/status/27109207870
Please count me.
Regards,
Mr. G.T.
Thnx for the free giveaway of ibVPN. A chance for me to watch videos early!
Terrible customer service. PPTP is unusable from common hotel/coffee shop networks which is exactly the situation you most need this type of service. OpenVPN reliability is somewhat better, but significantly slower.
It is good that you point out the customer service of IBVPN. I did not have such bad experience with them, nor did I try OpenVPN before, so I can’t say much about their customer service.