Howdy, Stranger!

It looks like you're new here. If you want to get involved, click one of these buttons!


Get Keepsolid VPN + Keepsolid SmartDNS Lifetime for 36$
New on LowEndTalk? Please Register and read our Community Rules.

All new Registrations are manually reviewed and approved, so a short delay after registration may occur before your account becomes active.

Get Keepsolid VPN + Keepsolid SmartDNS Lifetime for 36$

YmpkerYmpker Member
edited September 2020 in General

If you haven't gotten one of the two Keepsolid products yet, you can get this bundle of Keepsolid VPN and Keepsolid SmartDNS for a total of 36$ on Stacksocial with code vipsale40 .

https://stacksocial.com/sales/the-ultimate-keepsolid-lifetime-subscription-bundle

Read this article if you don't know the difference between a VPN and a SmartDNS.

There are currently more than 20+ LET/LES users who have purchased VPNUnlimited/Keepsolid VPN. For more details read my VPN LTD Comparison chart in this thread to find out more about VPNUnlimited/Keepsolid VPN and SmartDNS.

FAQ:

Can I trust a "no logs VPN provider with my life or other mission critical stuff?

No.

How fast is this VPN?

A user from the LE community (see aforementioned thread) measured up to 400 Mbps.

Is Wireguard supported with the VPN?

Yes.

Flix?

Flix USA only afaik (for both vpn/dns).

I hate VPNs and I don't see why people would trust them with their data. Grrrr...

Not everyone using a VPN "trusts" the provider with their (crucial) data and some are only selectively enabling VPN traffic. Also, not all logs are bad. Some are required for technical purposes such as device restrictions.

What is their log policy?

https://www.vpnunlimitedapp.com/help/more-about-vpn/best-no-log-vpn

Thanked by 3lokuzard vedran SLMob
«13

Comments

  • That doesn't look like much of a deal for me. I mean Keepsolid is like $15 meaning if we compare that bundle the SmartDNS would be around $21 and that don't look like a good deal, at least for me.

  • @CasualCanvas said:
    That doesn't look like much of a deal for me. I mean Keepsolid is like $15 meaning if we compare that bundle the SmartDNS would be around $21 and that don't look like a good deal, at least for me.

    The cheapest lifetime SmartDNS you can buy right now is KeepSolid SmartDNS for $24 (StackSocial VIPSALE40), so that's a $3 difference, if you need it :)

    Thanked by 1Ympker
  • YmpkerYmpker Member
    edited September 2020

    @CasualCanvas said:
    That doesn't look like much of a deal for me. I mean Keepsolid is like $15 meaning if we compare that bundle the SmartDNS would be around $21 and that don't look like a good deal, at least for me.

    Maybe not the best deal considering all the previous discounts, but certainly a good deal nonetheless. Even 36$ for just Keepsolid VPN would be worth it (just not the best price you can get) considering it's a LTD for a well established and performing VPN. Back then I paid 40$ for Keepsolid I believe and havent looked back.

  • You should really be getting paid from these providers for the free advertisements and reviews.
    Heck, even StackSocial!
    At least 99% of their LET/LES traffic is coming from your posts.
    Don't they have affiliate programs you could use? I'm pretty sure no one would mind using your referral code.
    You always almost convince me to get one of these VPN LTD's, but I already have enough VPS's that I use for OpenVPN/WireGuard/Proxies/SSH-Tunnels and I don't care much for streaming so the SmartDNS is useless for me.
    Thank you nonetheless!

    Thanked by 2Ympker dosai
  • YmpkerYmpker Member
    edited September 2020

    @lokuzard said:
    You should really be getting paid from these providers for the free advertisements and reviews.
    Heck, even StackSocial!
    At least 99% of their LET/LES traffic is coming from your posts.
    Don't they have affiliate programs you could use? I'm pretty sure no one would mind using your referral code.
    You always almost convince me to get one of these VPN LTD's, but I already have enough VPS's that I use for OpenVPN/WireGuard/Proxies/SSH-Tunnels and I don't care much for streaming so the SmartDNS is useless for me.
    Thank you nonetheless!

    Hehe, true. However, so far I only felt comfortable sending a reflink in pm and in a post only upon request. For example, I recently sent one to @MrPsycho for Appsumo. Btw. I have finally received the bonus. Thanks, mate :)

    Maybe one day, I'll add afflinks. Right now I dont feel too comfortable about it, though. I don't wanna add a "shilled" touch to the threads, if that makes sense?

    Thanked by 2Abd vedran
  • I agree that you should be paid some commission for your work, @Ympker! Thank you!

    I signed up for the VPNUnlimited/Keepsolid LTD you posted a while back. But now I'm wondering about SmartDNS: I'm hopelessly out of date on my knowledge here. I used to subscribe to one for a couple of years back in the 2014-5 time period, and it worked great until Flix decided to crack down. As we all know, things only got worse from there, as they later blocked datacenter IP ranges.

    I know that some VPN providers still provide workarounds, but now I see SmartDNS coming up again as a solution.

    Do you have any experience using Flix with SmartDNS?

    Thanked by 1Ympker
  • @aj_potc said:
    I agree that you should be paid some commission for your work, @Ympker! Thank you!

    I signed up for the VPNUnlimited/Keepsolid LTD you posted a while back. But now I'm wondering about SmartDNS: I'm hopelessly out of date on my knowledge here. I used to subscribe to one for a couple of years back in the 2014-5 time period, and it worked great until Flix decided to crack down. As we all know, things only got worse from there, as they later blocked datacenter IP ranges.

    I know that some VPN providers still provide workarounds, but now I see SmartDNS coming up again as a solution.

    Do you have any experience using Flix with SmartDNS?

    TBH their SmartDNS lacks some features (location chooser/IP update). And if you use a SmartDNS, all CDNs will consider your location as the DNS IP. So even if you're in Asia, CDNs will register your location as the U.S. other then that, it's quite nice.

  • A bunch of the US banking/financial and brokerage sites/apps have stopped providing access to users from outside the US. They have even blacklisted many of the VPN IP's (PIA for example). For those of us who travel outside the US for long periods of time, this is a huge issue - will a smart DNS like this one help get around the access restrictions? If not, are there are any cheap VPS providers where we can setup our own openvpn or privoxy to get around?

  • @the_astute said:
    A bunch of the US banking/financial and brokerage sites/apps have stopped providing access to users from outside the US. They have even blacklisted many of the VPN IP's (PIA for example). For those of us who travel outside the US for long periods of time, this is a huge issue - will a smart DNS like this one help get around the access restrictions? If not, are there are any cheap VPS providers where we can setup our own openvpn or privoxy to get around?

    1. SmartDNS only provides access to the sites specified on their page (usually streaming sites)
    2. Depends on your bank. If the bank blocks datacenter IPs as well, you are out of luck. All you can try is spin off multiple VPSes and check which one works, until it stops.
    Thanked by 2Ympker the_astute
  • @aj_potc said:
    I agree that you should be paid some commission for your work, @Ympker! Thank you!

    I signed up for the VPNUnlimited/Keepsolid LTD you posted a while back. But now I'm wondering about SmartDNS: I'm hopelessly out of date on my knowledge here. I used to subscribe to one for a couple of years back in the 2014-5 time period, and it worked great until Flix decided to crack down. As we all know, things only got worse from there, as they later blocked datacenter IP ranges.

    I know that some VPN providers still provide workarounds, but now I see SmartDNS coming up again as a solution.

    Do you have any experience using Flix with SmartDNS?

    Hello there mate,
    thanks for your feedback. Happy to hear I could help you find a VPN solution back then :)

    Regarding your question there are basically 2 benefits SmartDNS has to it imho:

    1. Since the traffic is not encrypted and only the DNS and therefor your location is spoofed for specific services, streaming videos/services perform much better with it than with VPN. Usually, if I use VPN on my PC which is connected with LAN I probably won't notice much of a performance difference to SmartDNS since the PC is a quite "powerful" device overall.

    Where SmartDNS shines (imho) is when using it on devices connected via wifi like my Fire TV Stick or Phone/Tablet. These devices have been prone to casual stuttering when connected to a VPN client in the past which is not to say Keepsolid VPN is bad as such but these devices (especially TV sticks) have just such little processing power and RAM sometimes, that they quickly overheat when generating a VPN connection for a longer time regardless whether that is now a connection to Keepsolid VPN or NordVPN (the vpn service doesnt matter). Casual stuttering would usually kick in after a while and the only reason I could track it back to was the device itself feeling like it was on fire.

    SmartDNS on the other hand does not require much/any system resources. There is no encryption going on or anything else that would be a stain on the system. Personally, I use SmartDNS on all my "Smart" Devices like Fire TV Stick and other TV sticks now. Also on my phone when at home. Technically speaking, SmartDNS, at times, can also be better performant than a VPN on PC, too. However the most improvement you will get using it on "weak" devices like Fire TV Stick etc.

    1. if you have a somewhat static or rarely changing IP using the SmartDNS on router level for all devices in your house is super convenient.
      I recommend you install the SmartDNS app from keepsolid on your phone and whenever your home IP is updated, just update it with one click in the App and all your home devices connected to wifi should be cleared to use the SmartDNS again.

    Among SmartDNS services Getflix (also ltd on stacksocial sometimes) is far more advanced which more options and much more channels but Flix only works on desktop with them iirc which is a pita. Keepsolid SmartDNS works solid for Flix US and also unblocks some other services, but there is no list of services it unblocks I think. I only need it for flix though, so all good. I can recommend it for that :)

    Thanked by 2sanvit aj_potc
  • @Ympker said: and also unblocks some other services

    This is the response I got from support regarding that

    you can access the most popular video streaming content, such as US-Netflix, BBC iPlayer, iTV, Amazon Prime, Hulu, Sony Crackle, RaiPlay, HBO Now, Disney Plus, ESPN+, Fubo TV, Popcornflix, CBS, HBO Max and Channel4.

    However, I only tried Disney+ and Netflix U.S. with it

    Thanked by 1Ympker
  • @sanvit said:

    @the_astute said:
    A bunch of the US banking/financial and brokerage sites/apps have stopped providing access to users from outside the US. They have even blacklisted many of the VPN IP's (PIA for example). For those of us who travel outside the US for long periods of time, this is a huge issue - will a smart DNS like this one help get around the access restrictions? If not, are there are any cheap VPS providers where we can setup our own openvpn or privoxy to get around?

    1. SmartDNS only provides access to the sites specified on their page (usually streaming sites)
    2. Depends on your bank. If the bank blocks datacenter IPs as well, you are out of luck. All you can try is spin off multiple VPSes and check which one works, until it stops.

    Any recommendations for cheap VPS providers that I can test? My need is very minimal - a few megs of transfer each month (just for accessing the sites/apps).

  • @sanvit said:

    @Ympker said: and also unblocks some other services

    This is the response I got from support regarding that

    you can access the most popular video streaming content, such as US-Netflix, BBC iPlayer, iTV, Amazon Prime, Hulu, Sony Crackle, RaiPlay, HBO Now, Disney Plus, ESPN+, Fubo TV, Popcornflix, CBS, HBO Max and Channel4.

    However, I only tried Disney+ and Netflix U.S. with it

    Ahh, I remember getting that list some time ago, too. Forgot about it haha. Yeah, the services supported are fair enough tbh. All the big names strikes like Flix, Prime, iPlayer, Disney, HBO.

  • @the_astute said:

    @sanvit said:

    @the_astute said:
    A bunch of the US banking/financial and brokerage sites/apps have stopped providing access to users from outside the US. They have even blacklisted many of the VPN IP's (PIA for example). For those of us who travel outside the US for long periods of time, this is a huge issue - will a smart DNS like this one help get around the access restrictions? If not, are there are any cheap VPS providers where we can setup our own openvpn or privoxy to get around?

    1. SmartDNS only provides access to the sites specified on their page (usually streaming sites)
    2. Depends on your bank. If the bank blocks datacenter IPs as well, you are out of luck. All you can try is spin off multiple VPSes and check which one works, until it stops.

    Any recommendations for cheap VPS providers that I can test? My need is very minimal - a few megs of transfer each month (just for accessing the sites/apps).

    Get a NAT VPS or Windscribe VPN 1$/mo/location offer, or just Windscribe Free (10GB/mo free I think).

    Thanked by 1the_astute
  • @Ympker said:

    @the_astute said:

    @sanvit said:

    @the_astute said:
    A bunch of the US banking/financial and brokerage sites/apps have stopped providing access to users from outside the US. They have even blacklisted many of the VPN IP's (PIA for example). For those of us who travel outside the US for long periods of time, this is a huge issue - will a smart DNS like this one help get around the access restrictions? If not, are there are any cheap VPS providers where we can setup our own openvpn or privoxy to get around?

    1. SmartDNS only provides access to the sites specified on their page (usually streaming sites)
    2. Depends on your bank. If the bank blocks datacenter IPs as well, you are out of luck. All you can try is spin off multiple VPSes and check which one works, until it stops.

    Any recommendations for cheap VPS providers that I can test? My need is very minimal - a few megs of transfer each month (just for accessing the sites/apps).

    Get a NAT VPS or Windscribe VPN 1$/mo/location offer, or just Windscribe Free (10GB/mo free I think).

    I will try Windscribe - do you happen to know if they are able to unblock financial sites/apps?

  • @the_astute i can recommend oraclecloud.com You get two VMs for free so test that if it works with your bank. Just don't upgrade billing after trial if you want any kind of piece of mind while using their services. xD

    Thanked by 1the_astute
  • @xaoc said:
    @the_astute i can recommend oraclecloud.com You get two VMs for free so test that if it works with your bank. Just don't upgrade billing after trial if you want any kind of piece of mind while using their services. xD

    will try it out - thanks!

  • the_astutethe_astute Member
    edited September 2020

    @Ympker said:

    @the_astute said:

    @sanvit said:

    @the_astute said:
    A bunch of the US banking/financial and brokerage sites/apps have stopped providing access to users from outside the US. They have even blacklisted many of the VPN IP's (PIA for example). For those of us who travel outside the US for long periods of time, this is a huge issue - will a smart DNS like this one help get around the access restrictions? If not, are there are any cheap VPS providers where we can setup our own openvpn or privoxy to get around?

    1. SmartDNS only provides access to the sites specified on their page (usually streaming sites)
    2. Depends on your bank. If the bank blocks datacenter IPs as well, you are out of luck. All you can try is spin off multiple VPSes and check which one works, until it stops.


    Any recommendations for cheap VPS providers that I can test? My need is very minimal - a few megs of transfer each month (just for accessing the sites/apps).


    Get a NAT VPS or Windscribe VPN 1$/mo/location offer, or just Windscribe Free (10GB/mo free I think).

    just tried windscribe and it's being blocked. It appears that all known VPN servers are blocked, so need a not very popular service/VPS that I can VPN/proxy off of. Since my consumption is so limited, I don't feel like paying too much for it.

  • @the_astute said:

    @Ympker said:

    @the_astute said:

    @sanvit said:

    @the_astute said:
    A bunch of the US banking/financial and brokerage sites/apps have stopped providing access to users from outside the US. They have even blacklisted many of the VPN IP's (PIA for example). For those of us who travel outside the US for long periods of time, this is a huge issue - will a smart DNS like this one help get around the access restrictions? If not, are there are any cheap VPS providers where we can setup our own openvpn or privoxy to get around?

    1. SmartDNS only provides access to the sites specified on their page (usually streaming sites)
    2. Depends on your bank. If the bank blocks datacenter IPs as well, you are out of luck. All you can try is spin off multiple VPSes and check which one works, until it stops.

    Any recommendations for cheap VPS providers that I can test? My need is very minimal - a few megs of transfer each month (just for accessing the sites/apps).

    Get a NAT VPS or Windscribe VPN 1$/mo/location offer, or just Windscribe Free (10GB/mo free I think).

    I will try Windscribe - do you happen to know if they are able to unblock financial sites/apps?

    Haven't used it for that, sorry.

  • @the_astute said:

    @xaoc said:
    @the_astute i can recommend oraclecloud.com You get two VMs for free so test that if it works with your bank. Just don't upgrade billing after trial if you want any kind of piece of mind while using their services. xD

    will try it out - thanks!

    Oh forgot to mention that your ip needs to match the billing address of your card in order to pass their anti'fraud thingy.

  • @the_astute said:
    just tried windscribe and it's being blocked. It appears that all known VPN servers are blocked, so need a not very popular service/VPS that I can VPN/proxy off of. Since my consumption is so limited, I don't feel like paying too much for it.

    Fortunately I haven't seen the blocking you've mentioned so far for the services I use. But as an expat, this could be a very problematic situation for me, too. I'm a bit worried to hear that this is happening.

    I would guess that these services are using a third-party provider to handle the geolocation and block IPs from known datacenters. There's a company Netflix uses for this (can't remember their name). They are quite good at what they do -- unfortunately for those of us who want to get around it.

  • @the_astute said:

    @Ympker said:

    @the_astute said:

    @sanvit said:

    @the_astute said:
    A bunch of the US banking/financial and brokerage sites/apps have stopped providing access to users from outside the US. They have even blacklisted many of the VPN IP's (PIA for example). For those of us who travel outside the US for long periods of time, this is a huge issue - will a smart DNS like this one help get around the access restrictions? If not, are there are any cheap VPS providers where we can setup our own openvpn or privoxy to get around?

    1. SmartDNS only provides access to the sites specified on their page (usually streaming sites)
    2. Depends on your bank. If the bank blocks datacenter IPs as well, you are out of luck. All you can try is spin off multiple VPSes and check which one works, until it stops.


    Any recommendations for cheap VPS providers that I can test? My need is very minimal - a few megs of transfer each month (just for accessing the sites/apps).


    Get a NAT VPS or Windscribe VPN 1$/mo/location offer, or just Windscribe Free (10GB/mo free I think).

    just tried windscribe and it's being blocked. It appears that all known VPN servers are blocked, so need a not very popular service/VPS that I can VPN/proxy off of. Since my consumption is so limited, I don't feel like paying too much for it.

    What is it exactly you are attempting to access?

  • @the_astute said: just tried windscribe and it's being blocked. It appears that all known VPN servers are blocked, so need a not very popular service/VPS that I can VPN/proxy off of. Since my consumption is so limited, I don't feel like paying too much for it.

    No, generally it's not going to be doable. Most brokerages don't just geoip but go significantly further (including VPN identification, TCP stream identification, buying subscriber data, explicit whitelists for residential IPs)

    At my bank if you log in with VPN they will permanently suspend your account and tell you to visit a branch for verification.

  • @hzr said:

    @the_astute said: just tried windscribe and it's being blocked. It appears that all known VPN servers are blocked, so need a not very popular service/VPS that I can VPN/proxy off of. Since my consumption is so limited, I don't feel like paying too much for it.

    No, generally it's not going to be doable. Most brokerages don't just geoip but go significantly further (including VPN identification, TCP stream identification, buying subscriber data, explicit whitelists for residential IPs)

    At my bank if you log in with VPN they will permanently suspend your account and tell you to visit a branch for verification.

    this is scary - so far, some of my banks have been ok with logging in from outside the US, but it's the other brokerage accounts that create an issue. It gets worse if you trying to open a new account or open a new credit card!

  • @Ympker said:

    @the_astute said:

    @Ympker said:

    @the_astute said:

    @sanvit said:

    @the_astute said:
    A bunch of the US banking/financial and brokerage sites/apps have stopped providing access to users from outside the US. They have even blacklisted many of the VPN IP's (PIA for example). For those of us who travel outside the US for long periods of time, this is a huge issue - will a smart DNS like this one help get around the access restrictions? If not, are there are any cheap VPS providers where we can setup our own openvpn or privoxy to get around?

    1. SmartDNS only provides access to the sites specified on their page (usually streaming sites)
    2. Depends on your bank. If the bank blocks datacenter IPs as well, you are out of luck. All you can try is spin off multiple VPSes and check which one works, until it stops.


    Any recommendations for cheap VPS providers that I can test? My need is very minimal - a few megs of transfer each month (just for accessing the sites/apps).


    Get a NAT VPS or Windscribe VPN 1$/mo/location offer, or just Windscribe Free (10GB/mo free I think).

    just tried windscribe and it's being blocked. It appears that all known VPN servers are blocked, so need a not very popular service/VPS that I can VPN/proxy off of. Since my consumption is so limited, I don't feel like paying too much for it.

    What is it exactly you are attempting to access?

    this is only one example of some of the sites that block - try logging into creditkarma.com from outside the US. They seem to have the best geo based blocking that I have encountered.

    Thanked by 1Ympker
  • @aj_potc said:

    @the_astute said:
    just tried windscribe and it's being blocked. It appears that all known VPN servers are blocked, so need a not very popular service/VPS that I can VPN/proxy off of. Since my consumption is so limited, I don't feel like paying too much for it.

    Fortunately I haven't seen the blocking you've mentioned so far for the services I use. But as an expat, this could be a very problematic situation for me, too. I'm a bit worried to hear that this is happening.

    I would guess that these services are using a third-party provider to handle the geolocation and block IPs from known datacenters. There's a company Netflix uses for this (can't remember their name). They are quite good at what they do -- unfortunately for those of us who want to get around it.

    Given the compliance issues that these institutions have to deal with, what I am hearing is that it will get worse over time :(

  • hzrhzr Member
    edited September 2020

    @the_astute said: this is only one example of some of the sites that block - try logging into creditkarma.com from outside the US. They seem to have the best geo based blocking that I have encountered.

    CK use several third parties that specifically follow you around the internet (like TM and Nudata); if you don't have any cookies from those places which are present in much of the top 500 sites, it's already considered high risk

    another thing they do is repeatedly poll in your browser and make it do basic maths calculations in various obfuscated methods to check latencies if you are behind a proxy. For example if you are in a different continent it will be impossible to respond in "are you within US" levels of latency, and you will be flagged accordingly. Speed of light stuff. TM also requests your browser to port scan yourself on localhost via <img onerror> and websocket onerror timing.

  • Wow, that's an incredible effort to block international users. I can imagine several scenarios where these efforts to weed out non-US users could generate false positives. For example, I can simulate higher ping times simply by saturating my Internet connection.

    What's the goal here? I can imagine one goal is to get rid of hackers and scammers, and by blocking large parts of the Internet, I'll bet it's a big help. But surely there are other ways they can check whether their customer is a US resident, right? At least before Covid-19, people were more mobile than ever before in history. It can't be a small number of US citizens/residents who spend a significant amount of time outside of the US.

  • hzrhzr Member
    edited September 2020

    @aj_potc said: For example, I can simulate higher ping times simply by saturating my Internet connection.

    Yeah, they will also mtr you back and compare. Some devices get solidly considered 'ok' and anything they don't consider known-good will be subject to more invasive testing.

    It's not an incredible amount of effort, in fact almost every single ecommerce and mmo game use something similar and they all share data with each other (chargeback your FFXIV subscription for example and every other company will know about it and can potentially refuse you service afterward), and if you block the tracking services then you are refused service period.

  • raindog308raindog308 Administrator, Veteran

    @hzr said: It's not an incredible amount of effort, in fact almost every single ecommerce and mmo game use something similar and they all share data with each other (chargeback your FFXIV subscription for example and every other company will know about it and can potentially refuse you service afterward), and if you block the tracking services then you are refused service period.

    It's amazing now many reputation-scoring services there are besides just credit.

    Banks have one entirely separate from credit reporting agencies (Chex). There are several in the financial industry where if you are an agent you can get effectively blacklisted for debt (e.g., Vector). It appears a network reputation reporting industry is sprouting up now...

Sign In or Register to comment.