18Mbps NordVPN on AC68u so easy...what's your speed?

[RussellInCincinnati]

Am having so much fun installing $33 dollar per year
nordvpn.com/special/deal

VPN software onto ALL the Merlin routers that am coming in contact with. Merlin and NordVPN's single web page help sheet makes it easy for people like me to install a whole house/site on a VPN, even with my near-zero VPN tech knowledge:
https://nordvpn.com/tutorials/asustwrt-merlin/openvpn/

Thus have started telling all my folks "why are you not using a VPN that works behind the scenes/automagically with every computer/tablet/phone, that uses your router for internet access, at your house or workplace?" It saves a bit of time showing people this article:
https://www.pcmag.com/article/352757/you-need-a-vpn-and-heres-why

Hint: go to the NordVPN server-recommendation site before you do the NordVPN install to get their server recommendation for the country and VPN-usage you're interested in, and note the server number that you will be browsing for (with an additional "1194" number in the browsed server config filename) a couple of minutes later during the VPN configuring:
https://nordvpn.com/servers/

The topic of OpenVPN speeds (NordVPN servers work with Merlin OpenVPN) with the mighty RT-AC86u router is dealt with well on this forum at
https://www.snbforums.com/threads/openvpn-performance-of-the-rt-ac86u.41217/

Here am hoping to gather what we can expect from all the Merlin routers, in terms of typical commercial VPN throughput after an unsophisticated default VPN installation. Merlin has noted over-200-megabits-per-second OpenVPN throughput on the RT-AC86u with 384.x software, which has some high-speed AES-NI encryption speedup instructions in its router multi-core CPUs.

My observations so far are 18 megabits per second NordVPN U.S. server max throughput on a Merlin v384.3 RT-AC68a (a slightly up-clocked RT-AC68u dual-core CPU without AES hardware encryption instructions), and 8 megabits per second max on a "classic" RT-AC66u (single CPU core router running Merlin v369).

Anybody else have some commercial VPN Merlin throughput numbers to contribute?

Also note that am not recommending NordVPN as being a superior VPN service in any way. It's just the service that am using because of its $2.75 dollars/month pricing for up to 6 computers (each of which can be a phone or tablet or desktop etc, with a router-for-the-whole-network only counting as one computer) and so-easy Merlin router installation. NordVPN may be the worst VPN service in the world for all I know, it's just an easy reference point for comparing the throughput variation due to the different Asus router CPUs.

• So, OpenVPN on RT-AC86u: 200+ megabits per second (as little as $200 dollars, also called the AC2900)
• RT-AC68A on U.S. NordVPN: 18 Mbps (AC68u now called the AC1900, $150 dollars, or maybe $80 if you know how to up-flash the Tmobile AC1900 version of this router)
• RT-AC66u original version on U.S. NordVPN: 8 Mpbs (AC66u now called the AC1750 or AC66u version B1, around $100 U.S. dollars).

 

[skeal]

I have a ac68u and a ac3100 the 68u was able to get up to 20m over vpn and my 3100 is often over 30m. I use Torguard.

 

[johhnyu]

18Mbps is terrible. The real problem is that OpenVPN is a pig. Wireguard fixes that problem and many others too-- for example, if you join a VPN on your mobile phone and then switch networks, it will immediately reconnect with no delay and lost of connectivity. Check out the link below.

Anyway, hopefully VPN service providers and SOHO routers like AsusWRT will start supporting it soon.

https://www.wireguard.com/

 

[RussellInCincinnati]

18Mbps is terrible. The real problem is that OpenVPN is a pig. Wireguard fixes that problem and many others too-- for example, if you join a VPN on your mobile phone and then switch networks, it will immediately reconnect with no delay and lost of connectivity. Check out the link below.

Anyway, hopefully VPN service providers and SOHO routers like AsusWRT will start supporting it soon.

https://www.wireguard.com/

You forgot to post your observed OpenVPN Merlin router throughput, the topic of this thread. Maybe start a different thread?

Also, you did not point out that AES encryption in OpenVPN is performance competitive with the Wire guard ChaCha20 encryption, for those higher end CPUs such as in the newer Asus routers that have the AES NI hardware assist encryption instructions. Look up this quote: "On desktop computers with hardware AES support, AES-128-GCM is still the faster choice".

 

[techboy]

I’m based in India with a 40 Mbps connection.

I use ExpressVPN.

Using L2TP, to American servers:

TP Link C1200 (USD 40ish) 25-35 Mbps
TP Link C2300 (USD 140ish) 30-37+ Mbps

 

[maurer]

why don't you just use pptp = it will give you way much speed than ovpn?
i know it;s hackable but for just p2p traffic who would sniff and decrypt it?!

 

[techboy]

Whenever I’ve tried P2TP my internet doesn’t switch on at all.

It works fine on L2TP. Why is that?

 

[tyspeed42]

I been on PIA for more than 2 years and get a consistent 60-80mbps on my Asus AC68W using Open VPN with Merlin/John LTS build and overclocked it to 1400/800 and my ISP is Charter 100/10 connection with the SB6183 modem. But even this is beginning to become not enough with so many devices connected in the home. The router itself and all AC68 series are close at 2798.38 BogoMIPS.

 

[RussellInCincinnati]

I been on PIA for more than 2 years and get a consistent 60-80mbps on my Asus AC68W using Open VPN with Merlin/John LTS build and overclocked it to 1400/800 and my ISP is Charter 100/10 connection with the SB6183 modem. But even this is beginning to become not enough with so many devices connected in the home. The router itself and all AC68 series are close at 2798.38 BogoMIPS.

What would your BogoMIPS be without the overclock? Any idea?

 

[RussellInCincinnati]

I’m based in India with a 40 Mbps connection.

I use ExpressVPN.

Using L2TP, to American servers:

TP Link C1200 (USD 40ish) 25-35 Mbps
TP Link C2300 (USD 140ish) 30-37+ Mbps

What is the operating system and/or software in these routers?

 

[tyspeed42]

What would your BogoMIPS be without the overclock? Any idea?

@1200/666 on my AC68U I get 2398.61, The AC68W come stock at 1000/800, never checked at the stock speeds.

cat /proc/cpuinfo
in putty ssh after your logged in will give you that info

Using Merlin/John LTS fork 3.0.0.4.374.43_2-30L2j9527

 

[techboy]

What is the operating system and/or software in these routers?

Default TP Link software just on the latest firmware.

 

[RussellInCincinnati]

Default TP Link software just on the latest firmware.

Last question...is this with ipsec encryption protocol? And if it is, is the encryption algorithm AES or 3DES?

 

[techboy]

Last question...is this with ipsec encryption protocol? And if it is, is the encryption algorithm AES or 3DES?

No clue. It is ExpressVPN.

WiFi is AES.

 

[maurer]

so it's plain l2tp - no encryption

 

[MatrixGeeker]

I want do to vpn but im afraid it will conflict when apply for loans /credit cards/applications and logging into bank

 

[MatrixGeeker]

What about softether vpn?

 

[RussellInCincinnati]

What about softether vpn?

You are proposing that Merlin firmware use the SoftEther VPN client, or that we somehow install into our routers the SoftEther VPN client, instead of whatever VPN client software is being used/written now by Merlin?

 

[TonyK132]

I want do to vpn but im afraid it will conflict when apply for loans /credit cards/applications and logging into bank

I am running Merlin using the PIA VPN using OpenVPN. I too have the problem that some financial websites do not like it when you access them via the VPN, so I setup some rules in the VPN Client to use the WAN when I access those individual sites (Merlin makes this easy to do). The only problem is that you have to use their IP address for the rule not their URL. I get that by using the ping command from a command box from Win10. This has been working well for me except when the site decides to use a server with a different IP address, but I have found that to be a very infrequent problem.

 

[RussellInCincinnati]

I want do to vpn but im afraid it will conflict when apply for loans /credit cards/applications and logging into bank

My only sometimes-observed VPN (well NordVPN) problems come from accessing Amazon.com. Don't know why loans/banks/etc would care about you using a VPN, unless the VPN server you are connecting up to is "in the wrong country."