Jonoro7

Medical costs, i.e. doctor

Hairdressing

Gym

Dry cleaning

Laundry

Excursions

WiFi

Phone calls

Boutique purchases

Casino

Notes. Some of above may be included depending on class and SSS status

The idea of walking round scanning for the strongest wifi signal is foolish unless you have a defective phone/tablet/laptop. The restriction slowing everything down is not the wifi link, it is the satellite link.

As for VPN, I have used them on board and the statement that they are only effective if the desired site blocks Regent is completely wrong. Regent, or rather their provider, blocks ceratin types of traffic, aka packets. It can block swathes of services based on packet inspection, a VPN overcomes this.

However the blocks are there for a reason - to stop the ignorant, or selfish, from hogging the bandwidth thus denying service to others.

Just look at the size of photos that some post online from the ship, many in the many Mbs.  Either ignorant or selfish.

Illegal.

Competition law prevents such restrictive practices.

Report it to uk government, even if you have no proof.

https://www.gov.uk/cartels-price-fixing/types-of-anticompetitive-activity

JMariner 

You are incorrect when you say:

"All VPN's will dramatically slow down your internet experience just by the nature of how a VPN works. "

All internet connections are made up of many individual connections in serries and it is slowest of these that determines the overall speed. Your concept of applying %s to each section is wrong.

I can acheive up and down speeds of well over 50Mb/s using NordVPN. Inserting such into an on-board connection of say 1Mb/s up and 200Kb/s down makes no difference to speed at all.

It does however increase latency, perhaps that is what you are thinking about but even then %s are inappropriate, just straight additions apply.

My main VPN is NordVPN which I use on-board ship.  I have also used the free VPN Tunnel Bear. Both work well, the free one was limited to 500Mb per day.

Back in April 2018 I analysed the internet offerings on-board and why the connectivity is so limited. It is still valid today however as Starlink's offerings may soon offer much lower latency, as for cost??

The 2018 analysis:

Regent doesn't appear to utilise on-board caching proxy servers with any respectable size of cache. 

Utilising such would bring dramatic improvements to average speed and latency experienced and no increased running costs.

Clay Clayton

8 hours ago, Clay Clayton said:

We are considering booking our first RSSC cruise (Viking had become our go-to lately) and am confused by something showing on the website.  Each stateroom category includes the statement “Concierge Level Amenities” but my TA says that doesn’t mean the free hotel and transfers...so if that is the case what does it mean?

TIA!

 

The clue is that there is no entry by Concierge, nor is there by Butler.  That means you don't have those services.

Understood.

I use a VPN with SIP based VOIP without problems, it can be configured to allow high latency.

Jmariner

Your point:

"I assume that it is already fairly secure. Never heard of any date breaches while on a ship network."

missed the point.  VPN may be required due to packet inspection/rejection - nothing to do with security or data breaches.

The increase in latency, <15%, is not significant, although I concede it will exacerbate packet loss in the event of significant data corruption.

Jmariner

4 hours ago, JMARINER said:

The problem with using a VPN on Regent is the greatly added latency (ping) that the VPN adds. The Regent ships usually have a ping of  700-900ms, which is already horrid. A VPN will easily add up to another 100-150 ms. 

 

I turn off my VPN when I am on the ship to speed things up. Since everything is routed thru the ships system and then again on the sat ground station, I assume that it is already fairly secure. Never heard of any date breaches while on a ship network.

 

J

The VPN  in this case is nothing to do with security. It is down to Regent or their providers inspecting the data packets and rejecting some types. For example we know they block video streaming packets unless you pay for the "enhanced" internet service. The VPN encrypts the packets, they then can not tell what type of packet it is.

You may find Regent blocks the SIP and RTP packets unless you buy their enhanced Wifi service.  This would kill the Wifi calling service.

A VPN would overcome this, you may want to set one up before you leave home.

You could try the launderettes.

There are a few channels available in the launderettes thst are not available in the suites.

May seem wierd but it is true.

Have a read of post 125 here:

It's an Illy machine by Francis francis.

You can only get a cup into it for a double shot, the capsules are all for (espresso, normal or decaf).

Both orange and grapefruit juices used to be freshly squeezed until around 5 years ago, and they were chilled too.

Now the standard is from a packet.

Freshly squeezed is warm and for the grapefruit full of pith and not nice.

Progress it is said.

A major reason, for me, to book onboard are the T&Cs.

I get US T&Cs on board but booking at home  I get UK ones with their savage cancellation terms.

Onboard discount when avaiable is circa 3% so not a major saving.

You have to register for an account and log on to it, then you MUST add the cruise you are booked on to your account.

Regent does not add cruises you have booked to your account.

5 hours ago, Travelcat2 said:

And, the more their hearing is affected, the louder the music they require

Travelcat2, actually the reverse is often true as I discovered when my hearing started failing. I have to have music much lower in volume now or it causes pain.

A quote "People with noise induced hearing loss often have a reduced tolerance to loud sound in the same frequency range (sensitivity to sound)"

http://www.hpaudiological.com/office/services/hearingLoss/typesofLoss

For me I avoid all the entertainment onboard except a few minutes of cassical guitar when avalable. The volume in general is unbearable to me.

No problems using a commercial VPN.

But the integrity of the internet connection is poor or to be honest very poor.

Latency of a second or more drops many connections and some connectionless connections.

If you need to rely on the service, don't go!

If it's just important, use when many are ashore.

Or a mobile ir adaptor, if your mibile has otg.

£4.50 on ebay

Many older types of mobiles had ir ports built in.  Buy an old mobile just for this.

An update, just off Mariner.

In our suite both tvs were Samsung 690 series. Wireless screen mirroring works fine as does  playing back jpg photos and mp4 videos from a USB stick plugged into the tv.

Still found 477 series in launderettes and whilst no screen mirroring would still play photos and videos from USB stick.

BUT the Regent remotes will not allow selection of input nor will onboard controls so to view USB files or screen mirror you need a different remote or as I do use a universal remote app on a mobile phone that has an IR port.

Tagalong well

Chromecast aka WIDI aka Miracast.  But not on Mariner.

The standard Samsung button or rather mini joystick on rear bottom right did not allow input switcing.

I dont thinK The OP said there was HDMI socket on wall, just appeared to be.  I suspect that this was USB charging port or a couple ogf them.

Last time I tried usb on tv is not blocked - very useful for charging phones, tablets etc. But the regent remote won't select it (and the magic button on the back bottom right won't either).

It used to be the case that the remotes in the launderettes were proper ones so you just borrow one.  Sadly it only took a few to not return them and just hog them.

Otherwise an ir blaster on a phone.

The real tragedy is that the, slghtly, cheaper TVs were bought.

Just around 20USD more and you would have been able to view photos and videos direct from your device - no wires needed.

Such a shame.