Internet and VPN use, Insignia

[1985rz1]

Has anyone tried Cisco AnyConnect?

[NoWhiners]

2 minutes ago, 1985rz1 said:

Yes at $9.99 per day.  But it does not provide additional bandwidth or speed, only access to streaming services.  There are other upgrades, but they offer only a second login with ($34.98 per day) or without ($24.99 per day) streaming access. 

 

Wow, clearly I didn't know this, so thanks. I don't think I need this but it's good to know,

[1985rz1]

Just now, NoWhiners said:

 

Wow, clearly I didn't know this, so thanks. I don't think I need this but it's good to know,

I've not used any of the upgrades, but I think you have to purchase all cruise days, or at least all cruise days from the day you purchase it.  I don't think it's a pick and choose a day.

[NoWhiners]

2 minutes ago, 1985rz1 said:

Has anyone tried Cisco AnyConnect?

 

Post #4 by Fam_Cruise said he uses Cisco but not Any Connect.

[LHT28]

there is  some info on the  wifi  @

https://www.oceaniacruises.com/value

scroll down to near the bottom of the page

[1985rz1]

On 9/16/2019 at 2:38 PM, Fam_Cruise said:

Cisco and ShrewSoft

Is that Cisco AnyConnect, and, if so, is that one that worked?

[NoWhiners]

11 minutes ago, LHT28 said:

there is  some info on the  wifi  @

https://www.oceaniacruises.com/value

scroll down to near the bottom of the page

 

How about that! Thanks for the link, very helpful (as always) 😉

[Fam_Cruise]

12 hours ago, 1985rz1 said:

Is that Cisco AnyConnect, and, if so, is that one that worked?

Yes and yes.

[ATSEAMYLIFE]

As to speak to GeoBlocking, I just got back from multi-country Europe land travel and was curious to try out streaming various services, since I had issues in Mexico at our future condo site.  Streaming Sirius via WiFI on my IPhone anywhere in France, Germany, Turkey, and Switzerland wasn't an issue; even on trains.  It worked just like at home in the USA. 

Streaming Hulu, Netflix and Prime was a different story.  I had experimented with several VPN's in MX and none worked.  I used Cactus smart DNS in Europe and could stream all but Amazon Prime to my IPhone.  If I turned off the DNS I could get the European version of Prime.  Next trip to the condo I will try out the DNS using my Fire Stick on the TV.          

Edited October 10, 2019 by ATSEAMYLIFE

[bobnsandi]

All posters: Thanks for the useful information.

 

Not related to streaming, but to VPN usage in

general:

 

We use PIA with pretty good results. We had just signed up when we

stayed in Australia in 2016-17. Certain US websites (Medicare, some banks,

etc) will NOT connect to a user who is outside the US. Once we turned

on the VPN, using a US link, we could connect and perform the functions that we

needed.

 

Used the VPN onboard Holland-America, in order to bypass some

URL restrictions they have. Was clued in on this by another computer

nerd who was onboard (he was well under 30 in age!).

 

As noted about O, HAL uses gateways in Florida, so when you

use the onboard wifi, your IP address will be in Florida. Thus, the

restrictions I mentioned above (banks, etc) do not apply.

 

[NoWhiners]

Happy to see that people are still adding info to this question. The more I read, the less sure I am about needing a VPN (for Sirius radio only).

 

Thanks everyone.

[PaulMCO]

Most of the cruise lines use EMC satellites services (formerly known as MTN).  Headquarters are in Palm Bay FL, so that is why you have a FL IP address.  VPN does help in many cases with blocked sites, especially streaming sites.

[Fam_Cruise]

19 hours ago, PaulMCO said:

Most of the cruise lines use EMC satellites services (formerly known as MTN).  Headquarters are in Palm Bay FL, so that is why you have a FL IP address.  VPN does help in many cases with blocked sites, especially streaming sites.

Correct, MTN was acquired by Emerging Markets Communications in 2015.  But minor correction, EMC's headquarters is at 3044 North Commerce Parkway in Miramar, FL 33025.

 

http://emcconnected.com/contact-us/

[PaulMCO]

2 hours ago, Fam_Cruise said:

Correct, MTN was acquired by Emerging Markets Communications in 2015.  But minor correction, EMC's headquarters is at 3044 North Commerce Parkway in Miramar, FL 33025.

 

http://emcconnected.com/contact-us/

Just down the street.

The web site will show you which ports will have enhanced internet.  Oceania's "Wavenet" product besides have some additional compression (increasing the SAT bandwidth) utilizes terrestrial connections when in port to give greater speeds.

[ATSEAMYLIFE]

On 10/11/2019 at 6:51 PM, NoWhiners said:

Happy to see that people are still adding info to this question. The more I read, the less sure I am about needing a VPN (for Sirius radio only).

 

Thanks everyone.

I'm 99.9% sure you won't.  However, if you sail after New Years I will let you know from first hand experience.  Good thing is if you're still unsure just download a VPN or Smart DNS pay for one month then cancel when you get back.  I use Smart DNS which is only $4.99 per month month to month.  You could probably download the app on the ship if you decided you need it.  

Edited October 13, 2019 by ATSEAMYLIFE

[NoWhiners]

11 minutes ago, ATSEAMYLIFE said:

I'm 99.9% sure you won't.  However, if you sail after New Years I will let you know from first hand experience.  Good thing is if you're still unsure just download a VPN or Smart DNS pay for one month then cancel when you get back.  I use Smart DNS which is only $4.99 per month month to month.  You could probably download the app on the ship if you decided you need it.  

 

I think you're right. We sail in November/December. 

 

That's a good idea to download for a month. Right now, I am more worried about not getting a decent internet connection, based on other comments I've read. 

 

I'll try and remember to update this thread while we're onboard about my success with Sirius radio, and internet in general.

 

Thanks for all your help, I really appreciate it.

[kimcheeboy]

FYI, just got off the Insignia in Oct 2019, and I had success connecting to both Private Internet Access (PIA) and my Synology home VPN using the free included level internet access.

 

I found internet speeds to be in the 2 mbps range while we sailed in the eastern Caribbean area. I streamed a lot of Youtube so at the end of the cruise, I consumed about 19GBs in 7 days. Pretty good, I'd say.

[bobnsandi]

16 hours ago, kimcheeboy said:

. I streamed a lot of Youtube so at the end of the cruise, I consumed about 19GBs in 7 days. Pretty good, I'd say.

 

Excellent!

[NoWhiners]

17 hours ago, kimcheeboy said:

FYI, just got off the Insignia in Oct 2019, and I had success connecting to both Private Internet Access (PIA) and my Synology home VPN using the free included level internet access.

 

I found internet speeds to be in the 2 mbps range while we sailed in the eastern Caribbean area. I streamed a lot of Youtube so at the end of the cruise, I consumed about 19GBs in 7 days. Pretty good, I'd say.

 

Thank you so much for posting this. I am pleasantly surprised. I hope you come back and can answer a question. Did you use the internet in your cabin or out somewhere else on the ship? Was the signal pretty weak in your cabin or particularly strong in some places?

 

And, if you used the internet in your cabin, can you tell us which cabin or at least which deck and fore, aft, or middle?

 

Thanks again.

[kimcheeboy]

5 minutes ago, NoWhiners said:

 

Thank you so much for posting this. I am pleasantly surprised. I hope you come back and can answer a question. Did you use the internet in your cabin or out somewhere else on the ship? Was the signal pretty weak in your cabin or particularly strong in some places?

 

And, if you used the internet in your cabin, can you tell us which cabin or at least which deck and fore, aft, or middle?

 

Thanks again.

I can only speak about Insignia specifically, but I used their WiFi network constantly in my room mid-ship on Deck 6 (specifically cabin 6033), in the card room, lounge, in the GDR and buffet. Never did I have weak signal anywhere I tried on the ship. 

 

I also noticed a speed benefit to using VPN beyond just the security aspect. Seeing as how Oceania sells tiered internet service plans, they likely speed throttle users on their free tier to provide better service for their paid users. They likely use either DNS or packet inspection methods to detect your activities and throttle such as blocking Youtube.com. With VPN, neither detection method works hence you get full speed all the time. I noticed that non-blocked sites were slower to load when VPN was disconnected. but significantly faster when VPN enabled.

[NoWhiners]

Just now, kimcheeboy said:

I can only speak about Insignia specifically, but I used their WiFi network constantly in my room mid-ship on Deck 6 (specifically cabin 6033), in the card room, lounge, in the GDR and buffet. Never did I have weak signal anywhere I tried on the ship. 

 

I also noticed a speed benefit to using VPN beyond just the security aspect. Seeing as how Oceania sells tiered internet service plans, they likely speed throttle users on their free tier to provide better service for their paid users. They likely use either DNS or packet inspection methods to detect your activities and throttle such as blocking Youtube.com. With VPN, neither detection method works hence you get full speed all the time. I noticed that non-blocked sites were slower to load when VPN was disconnected. but significantly faster when VPN enabled.

 

That works for me, since we will also be on Insignia 😊 And we will be in 6060, on the other side but about the same location. Interesting note on the VPN allowing faster speed.

 

Thanks for coming by again and answering my questions.

[NoWhiners]

Just wanted to come back and post our experience on Insignia. Got off last week after 25 days; we found the internet in general to be quite good. I was able to use my Sirius radio almost all the time, the only problem was getting on at high demand times, but that only happened a few times. I was always able to get on after a few minutes, so no huge issue.

 

I will say that I had downloaded a bunch of Netflix stuff, just in case, and was never able to view them. I kept getting a "can't contact Netflix now" message. I thought that was the whole point of downloading, so you could view offline. When I tried to Google this, any answer that went to the Netflix site couldn't be accessed. They do a great job blocking Netflix 😁

[ATSEAMYLIFE]

1 hour ago, NoWhiners said:

They do a great job blocking Netflix 😁

I'll try it with my Smart DNS next week and on land in Mexico end of January.  Also have been using Hulu at home and will be trying that on board and in Mexico; along with Amazon Prime videos. 

Downloaded stuff from Netflix has never been a problem with me in the past.      

[NoWhiners]

1 minute ago, ATSEAMYLIFE said:

I'll try it with my Smart DNS next week and on land in Mexico end of January.  Also have been using Hulu at home and will be trying that on board and in Mexico; along with Amazon Prime videos. 

Downloaded stuff from Netflix has never been a problem with me in the past.      

 

That would be very helpful, thanks. If it works, I might give it a go.

 

Not sure why the downloaded Netflix didn't work. I just tried it at home, with my wifi disconnected and it worked fine. I suppose it could have been operator error (but that's highly unlikely😉).

 

[ATSEAMYLIFE]

We just got back from 11 days on Insignia.  I tried all manner of WiFI and VPN.  Nothing works well.  The speed is horrible.  Best I got on a speed test was 1.8 download and .8  upload.  You will be able to stream Sirius radio, but nothing else (Netflix, Hulu, Prime, etc) as the bandwidth isn't there.  I could Email and text well.  I could text one photo at a time.  If I tried two or a short video clip my phone would time out before anything would upload.  We tried to FaceTime once with the grandkids and it just froze up the video but the audio worked.