Giganews

December 1st, 2010 by admin

Serving consumers, Internet service providers, telecommunications companies, and multi-service operators in over 170 different countries, Giganews is the undisputed industry leader in Usenet services. Giganews newsgroups provide the fastest, most reliable Usenet experience on the planet. Their news servers offer the highest quality newsgroup retention and completeness available.

Giganews has been setting the industry standard in Usenet service for a long, long time.  They are consistently raising the bar by which other Usenet providers are measured.  This is especially true of binary retention.  Currently Giganews has the highest retention of all Usenet providers.  This is pretty insane when you consider it is over 1200 days!  That’s more than 3 years of binary retention!

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HideMyAss

December 15th, 2010 by admin

The popular proxy service, Hide My Ass!, also has an equally popular VPN offering.  Hide My Ass! Pro is an advanced yet simple to use application which anonymously encrypts your entire internet connection (by using a VPN – virtual private network system).  Their software automatically works with any application or protocol – whether this be web browsing, instant-messaging/IRC, online games, Skype, etc.  Simply put, any application which requires an internet connection will be encrypted and your IP address (and in some cases your country) will be virtually changed with just a click of a button.

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VyprVPN

December 15th, 2010 by admin

VyprVPN guards your online activity and communications from your ISP, hackers and data snoops, restoring your online privacy, security and freedom. Use a personal VPN to create a secure connection on cellular networks, public Wi-Fi and anywhere you connect to the Internet with VyprVPN, the fastest VPN platform. VyprVPN runs on a network built from the ground up by a company committed to restoring individuals’ rights to online privacy.

VyprVPN is a top notch VPN service when compared to the other premium providers – which is amazing considering that they are a relatively new company.  Goldenfrog, the company that runs VyprVPN, is actually from the same group that does Giganews (Usenet provider).  Giganews has been a dominant player in Usenet for many years, so it’s no wonder their VPN offering is doing well too.

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UseNetServer

December 1st, 2010 by admin

UseNetServer is the kind of no-frills Usenet service some people gravitate towards.  They don’t add on a bunch of fancy bells and whistles to their offerings, and this translates to a very simple but effective service.  You need only look at their website to understand what we mean when we say no-frills.  Not that it’s a bad thing, because a lot of people aren’t looking for free newsreaders or bonus addons – they just want Usenet, and they want it cheap!

One of the primary ways UseNetServer differentiates itself from the competition is by offering unlimited downloads with all customer plans.  Right off the bat this separates them from the rest of the field.  However it should be noted the number of concurrent connections they offer on their premium plans are lower than most of the rest of the competition, so there is a balance here.  Still, they do offer a good number of concurrent connections, so you should be able to maximize your download speeds.  None of our editors reported seeing drastically lower speeds with UseNetServer than any other provider.

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ThunderNews

December 1st, 2010 by admin

ThunderNews is definitely a premium Usenet provider.  They offer extremely competitive rates across all of their plans and provide a lot of extra features to boot.  ThunderNews servers peer with hundreds of other Usenet news servers across the Usenet network to provide their users access to every newsgroup available. They offer a great combination of connection speed, article completeness, and long article retention.  Plus they do all this while being uncensored, unfiltered and without logs.

ThunderNews has multiple servers in the US and the EU to service their customers.  This means that their account holders should see fast connection speeds whether they are in the US, or in Europe.  Their retention is pretty good when compared against the rest of the field, and they are actually ahead of a few of their major competitors in this feature category.

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EasyNews

December 1st, 2010 by admin

Easynews is the original, web-based Usenet service that makes it easy to browse, preview and download from newsgroups.  For over 15 years, Easynews has provided premium Usenet access right from your web browser.  There’s nothing to install… simply login and start browsing! If you’re new to Usenet, then their web-based newsgroup browser is the perfect choice to get started.  In just minutes you’ll be browsing newsgroups as easily as you browse websites, with simple navigation, thumbnail previews and fast, easy downloading… right in your web browser!  Easynews also supports NNTP, so you can easily access Usenet with your favorite newsreader.

The Usenet service offered by Easynews is “as easy as it gets”.  They are one of the few companies out there that provide customers with the ability to download directly from their web browser.  Although some would consider this “sub-optimal”, it has a significant benefit for new users because it is so freaking easy.  You don’t need newsreader software, nor do you need to input server and user parameters.  You just login to their website, search, and start downloading.  Totally hassle-free.  Of course you can use a newsreader if you wish, which most experienced Usenet users will go for by default.

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Newshosting

December 29th, 2010 by admin

Newshosting is a name that many people know in the Usenet service industry. Newshosting has been around for quite some time and has consistently offered premium usenet service for affordable prices. Newshosting has also recently teamed up with the folks over at Easynews, which not only increases the features they are able to offer their customers, but it also indicates their solid reputation among the top tier providers.

Plans from Newshosting are very competitive when compared to other top tier providers. The pricing for their unlimited plans is on par with most of the major competitors. It isn’t the least expensive, but nor is it the most expensive. This means Newshosting is right in that sweet spot of service providers. Since Newshosting also offers the same industry standard features you have come to expect from the big boys, they really aren’t lacking in the feature department. This includes free 256bit SSL encryption on all accounts, uncensored newsgroups, and high speed access. Newshosting is also one of select providers that offer free trials, which is great for those who want to try the service before they buy.

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StrongVPN

December 15th, 2010 by admin

If you are in the market for a VPN account, it is very likely you’ve already heard of StrongVPN. They have been providing Internet Services, as well as VPN, for a very long time, and they understand what it takes to provide the customer with a quality service.

StrongVPN is run by the same group that manages Reliable Hosting.  This means you are getting your VPN service from a rather large company that has been around for quite some time.  In addition to being very well known, StrongVPN generally has a good reputation – whether it is for the hosting services or the VPN services.

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CactusVPN

February 20th, 2012 by admin

CactusVPN is a relative newcomer to the VPN industry but they have come on strong with a solid service and low prices.  The VPN service from CactusVPN is inexpensive on a per month basis, and includes a lot of high end features.  For starters, every VPN package from CactusVPN is unlimited AND includes PPTP, L2TP, and OpenVPN protocols.  The servers for CactusVPN are located in the US, UK and Netherlands.  CactusVPN does allow P2P/BT on their NL servers, and with unlimited unmetered bandwidth, file transfer is easy with CactusVPN.  Every plan from CactusVPN includes a no questions asked 30 day money back guarantee.  In addition to the guarantee, CactusVPN offers a 24 hour free trial with no credit card required.  It’s good to offer the money back guarantee, it’s great to offer a full day trial with no credit card.  It’s amazing to do both!

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Overplay

December 15th, 2010 by admin

Simply put, Overplay provides a service which can encrypt your internet traffic via one of their high speed and reliable VPN servers. This will secure everything you send from interception by your regular ISP or WiFi provider. Overplay VPN disguises your connection and makes it appear to websites that you visit as if you’re connected directly via our international servers. In effect you are changing your IP address for one of their US, UK, Irish, Canadian, or Swedish IP Addresses.

Overplay tends to focus on providing VPN service so their customers all over the world can watch online TV. You might have noticed the TV in their logo, and the word “play” in their name! This includes watching BBC iPlayer, Hulu, and other popular sites that offer free TV online. These sites normally block access to the free content and allow only certain countries access. For example, outside of North America, Hulu is blocked. And, outside of the UK, BBC iPlayer is blocked. Well, not anymore – not if you have Overplay VPN!

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Astraweb

December 1st, 2010 by admin

Astraweb is great value for your money Usenet.  Free SSL is available on all accounts and completion is 99%+.  Multiple links to high quality providers means lightning fast speeds.  Astraweb server farms are located in the US and EU and 20 simultaneous connections are allowed for customers.  Astraweb does not resell and has total control over their servers and farms.

Astraweb’s retention and pricing are perhaps their greatest strengths.  Astraweb’s binary retention is among the best in the business and now over 900 days.  Their pricing is also very inexpensive when compared to the other providers.  Their least expensive plan, although sometimes more money than their counterparts, tends to offer you more bang for your buck.  This means you can count on a healthy download quota, long retention, no term limit, and a low price at Astraweb, if you’re in the market for an inexpensive plan.

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NewsDemon

December 1st, 2010 by admin

NewsDemon provides blazing fast Usenet access over their best-in-class news server hardware. They have servers in the United States and Europe, which provides great coverage for both US and international customers.  NewsDemon provides affordable access to newsgroups through their 256-Bit secure server connections at the fastest possible speeds. They employ direct peering connections between the U.K. and European server farm, so U.K. and European customers experience the same blazing fast speeds as the U.S. customers.

NewsDemon has been around for a good number of years and is generally considered a premium provider.  The plans and service offered by NewsDemon are competitive with the best of the best, and you should pay particular attention to their middle-tier (medium) and their premium (high end) plans when doing your comparison shopping.  While some providers are tempted to raise rates, NewsDemon is offering a lifetime lock-in for their premium subscribers.  If you’re a long time Usenet junkie, that could make a significant difference to you down the road.  Their pricing for block (non-expiring / non-term) plans is also quite competitive, if you’re into that type of service.

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IPVanish

March 21st, 2012 by admin

IPVanish is a brand new VPN service just released in 2012.  The service rollout seems to have gone very smoothly based on customer feedback.  Our editors took it for a test drive, and from what we can tell, the IPVanish VPN client application and VPN service are working very well.  IPVanish offers OpenVPN, L2TP, and PPTP VPN protocols for a fairly low monthly price.  All IPVanish plans are unlimited downloads without any speed limitations.  At the moment they have 15 countries available, ranging from the big names of US and UK to small foreign countries like Malaysia and Hungary.  The IPVanish VPN client for Windows makes it a breeze to select between countries and switch protocols.  This means you can hide your IP address very quickly, and change it at will.  IPVanish VPN is compatible with Windows, Mac, iOS, and Android.

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iVPN.net

May 3rd, 2011 by admin

iVPN.net is a new player in the VPN service industry having opened its doors to the world in 2009.  Their signature offering and what sets them apart from the competition is Multihop VPN over OpenVPN.  This is an advanced offering not typically found in the VPN market.  This type of VPN service offers a higher degree of security and privacy to the user since the VPN connection is routed through an intermediary before being forwarded to its final destination.  All Multihop VPN from iVPN.net is bounced once before reaching the final destination.  This means there are three location points in the chain:  origin, intermediary, and final destination.  In addition to Multihop OpenVPN, regular singlehop OpenVPN and L2TP/IPSec are available from iVPN.net.

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Sh3lls.net

October 26th, 2011 by admin

Sh3lls.net, the popular shell and web hosting provider, also offers a VPN service. Their packages offer OpenVPN as well as PPTP VPN protocols, for very modest prices. The OpenVPN service from Sh3lls comes with a web panel to download the configuration files and client software for Windows, Linux and Mac. To maintain high speeds and reliability Sh3lls.net only adds a maximum of 30 users per OpenVPN server. This does a great job of making sure there is no slow down in speeds. Sh3lls also advertises their VPN servers as being “highly ddos protected.” The OpenVPN from Sh3lls uses 1024bit keys for authentication. Sh3lls does not block any countries from ordering, and is based out of Hong Kong.

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Ngroups.net

April 30th, 2011 by admin

Ngroups.net is another solid usenet service provider that has been around for many years. The interesting part is not many people know of them! Originally started in November of 2003, Ngroups.net was part of a Swedish company – GL Design IT. That company was already operating a Swedish Usenet Newsgroup provider “Usenet.SE”. Ngroups.net grew out of that original business and has since expanded their focus to the US/North American market. NGroups.net still maintains both US and EU servers for their usenet service, and they are quite well known in the EU as a solid usenet provider.

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Supernews

December 29th, 2010 by admin

Supernews Usenet, not to be confused with SuperNews! the funny cartoon, has been around since 1995. That gives them more than 15 years of experience providing usenet service for customers. They have watched Usenet evolve over the last two decades and they have maintained a reliable and affordable service for their customers.

Supernews only offers one plan for usenet service: an unlimited, no limit, no restrictions, and no-holds-barred plan at an affordable price. Their comprehensive unlimited service with no rate limits or download restrictions makes it extremely easy to understand for new customers. While other providers are sporting a catalog of plans, sometimes with more than dozen different offerings, Supernews keeps it simple. One plan, no limits, no B.S., for one low price.

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Invisible Browsing VPN

May 3rd, 2011 by admin

Invisible Browsing VPN, or ibVPN for short is a relatively new player in the personal VPN service market, but they have come out strong with solid offerings for customers.  Invisible Browsing is best known for their anonymous browsing software solution of the same name.  The VPN service is a recent expansion, and ibVPN offers two major categories of VPN plans:  single user and multi user.  This is what sets them apart from a number of VPN service providers because most VPN services do not offer options for multiple users.  Think of a multi user account like a family account on your cell phone.  One plan, one price, a certain number of connections.  Although these types of plans aren’t completely unheard of – they are not typically offered by a lot of larger VPN providers.  However, they can provide a substantial savings for households looking for VPN services, or people with lots of computers that all require VPN service.

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Usenet-News.net

December 29th, 2010 by admin

Usenet-News.Net has the tagline, “No Nonsense, Just Quality Usenet”, and boy do they mean it! They don’t promote their services with a flashy website. They let the quality of their usenet service speak for itself. Traditionally, most usenet providers offer pay-per-month accounts. Some of these plans have quotas, or limits on their transfer size – others are unlimited plans. Further still, some providers allow rollover, if the quota goes unused by the end of the month; the remaining quota amount rolls over into the next month. Usenet-News.Net mostly focuses on what are known as “Block Accounts”. These accounts do not have term limits, but instead are focused on the transfer size: 2GB, 10GB, 50GB, 1024GB, etc.

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PureVPN

May 3rd, 2011 by admin

PureVPN is a relative new player to the VPN service market, having opened their doors in 2007.  Since most of the VPN service review sites have picked up on them their popularity has increased quite substantially.  They are operated by GZ Systems Ltd. a Hong Kong based company.  What sets PureVPN apart from a lot of the other providers is that they are one of the few that include SSTP support in all of their plans, and our editors feel like this is a big step in the right direction.  Although SSTP is the most secure it is unfortunately only available for windows, but it can be used to get around a  lot of blocking done in countries like UAE and China where L2TP/IPSec does not work or is actively monitored. Read the rest »

Express VPN

December 15th, 2010 by admin

ExpressVPN is a premium VPN provider offering one of the simplest setup processes in the industry and fast, unclogged gateway servers spread across a number of locations. They are a trusted leader in providing customers with safety and security online.

ExpressVPN primarily offers its customers SSL VPN, via the OpenVPN software application. OpenVPN is widely used in the VPN industry by many providers because SSL generally offers enhanced security and privacy. ExpressVPN also offers PPTP, but PPTP is generally considered to be less secure, and therefore not as good, as SSL VPN via OpenVPN.

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