VPN Set Up

by komobu

I use Nord VPN and want to connect it to my router, or a device between my Nvidia Shield and Router.

The difficulty I am having is I never seem to remember to start my VPN before using my apps on my shield. Also, my performance on my shield seems to decrease when I am also running a vpn on it.

The router I have is for Fios Quantal Gateway.

My nvidia shield is ran though a ethernet cable and not wifi. Is it possible to use the vpn for just that ethernet cable?

I have red that I may have to get another router. If I go that route, what router will allow me to configure nordvpn on it and still connect to my Fios Quantal Gateway? Will I have to connect a router to a router? I was wondering about connecting another router to that allows nordvpn to run from it and attaching my Shield ethernet cord to it.

Thanks for any advice.

berndt_toast83

Why can't you install NordVPN on the shield and set it to Auto Start on ethernet? That way it will always turn on when connected to ethernet. You can further enhance it by adding trusted apps that don't need VPN (like Netflix, Prime VIdeo, etc...). I use this setup on my Shield and it works like a charm.

harrybarracuda

There is an overhead involved in encrypting/decrypting VPN traffic, so that may be what you see as "slowness".

You can enable VPN on lots of routers, but note that it will encrypt traffic from any device that connects to it. In my case I have an Orbi mesh, but I don't use the VPN that often so I prefer to just turn it on and off as required on the device, rather than enable it in the Router.

You say you use Nord, I don't know what sort of controls it has. Take a look at IronSocket, it lets you customise the connection with Full, Light and No Encryption. So if speed is an issue you might find you can choose the latter and it may work faster.

Shineyads

I use ExpressVPN and once the vpn is on its always on. I'm sure there must be an equivalent for Nord.

Don't know why it would change the performance of the Shield though - it might slow down your bandwidth, but the actual Shield shouldn't be affected. Have you tried a factory reset? My 2015 shield used to slow down a lot after a while and a reset always solved it, but never had to do that on my 2017 and 2019 models.

SpiritualWindow8789

For Express VPN I think you need to pay extra for the VPN to be installed on the router. You also need to buy a specific router which it’s compatible with. I’d imagine this is the same for all VPNs but I’m not 100% sure.

I can’t see there being any reason having it on your device should slow things down. Have you tried changing the server you’re using and seeing what results to get?

PuzzleheadedScratch6

I used to use Nord but it kill my Internet speed starting using IP vanish and I haven’t had any issues and I set the VPN to connect at start up of my shield that way I never forget to connect it but once you turn it on you don’t have to turn it on every time just if you restart the device

dabig49

Most likely you won't be able to install it on your ISP gateway. install it on your Shield. I have it installed on all my Shields and PC's.

It's easy.... a VPN is always going to slow your speed down

apodicity

The VPN crypto is computationally intensive. If the Shield is using the CPU to do it, it's gonna hurt. If you want performance, you probably need to get a router that has a crypto coprocessor. If that's impractical for whatever reason, you need to find out how much CPU the encryption is using.

Additionally, you need to connect to a VPN that is close to you network-wise. This may not be where you expect it to be geographically. Finally, network tuning is sort of a black art, and you probably don't have permission on the shield to properly tune it. This is another reason to use a router for this purpose.

FWIW, I think Mullvad is a good VPN to use. No BS, and they don't keep records. You can pay with bitcoin and they have no idea who you are. That way they can't be coerced by the government to furnish any info about you because there isn't any.

If you can use ipv6 to connect to your iptv provider, Hurricane Electric offers a "tunnel broker" service for free that you can use as a VPN. You can use ipv4 to connect to it, obviously, but you can only connect to ipv6 hosts with it. It is fast --pretty much as fast as you will find anywhere for any price.

If crypto turns out to be slowing you down, you may be able to use the VPN without it. For IPTV purposes, IMHO you really don't even need the crypto.

apodicity

You can use anything on your network as your VPN gateway. It doesn't have to be your router. With the right hardware, you could set up a headless linux box and get excellent performance.

Bigbob666

This is what I do.

I use an ASUS RT-AC86U using Nordvpn with a dedicated ip.

Everything goes through Asus router apart from my smart TV for Netflix. Which is connected to the isp router/modem.

I dont bother setting the isp router in modem only mode and it works fine this way.

hboinay

You're way over-complicating things, you can have your vpn always on and select apps you want to use or bypass it in split-tunneling settings. Just set and forget.