Yet, the best news regarding Hotspot Shield is the quality of the server network. Being able to choose the precise locations of the servers could be useful to unblock a service available in a country but with exclusive features for different cities, like YouTube TV, for example. Once again, though, it’s too bad that our choice is limited to a country. This includes Australia, Japan, India, Turkey and – surprisingly enough – China and Hong Kong. Europe, for instance, has servers from Spain to Russia, with server availability in other key areas elsewhere in the world. Actually, it doesn’t even come close to that since there are only 20 different countries available, but it’s still more than enough to provide worldwide coverage, which is more than many providers do, sometimes even with multiple servers. The VPN network of Hotspot Shield cannot be considered the vastest there is. But it still feels short and, honestly, we could use some more: a kill switch for instance is already a common addition these days and something everyone expects to see. The latter becomes very important when connecting to questionable networks, but it’s possible to opt for turning the VPN on automatically even for the ones that are safe, granting full protection when in public. Surely, there are nice editable options: having Hotspot Shield run on computer startup, enabling it to prevent IP leaks, choosing the language of the client and also a couple of extra features to have the VPN turn itself on automatically when connecting to public Wi-Fi hotspots. But, unfortunately, there’s not much room to move around here either, despite still looking visually attractive. This exaggerated simplicity carries towards the settings department, which by itself is something we always like to check to find any hidden pearls. Similarly it’s only possible to access the country server list after already being connected to one of them, which is strange to say the least. It’s unfortunate that users are not able to choose different protocols – nor even see which protocol or port we’re using at the time. IP Leak Prevention and Automatic Wi-Fi Protection Torrenting is allowed, but you must be careful which servers you choose for this purpose, as there’s no indication of any of them being exclusive for it. Because of that, we get the feeling the company exaggerated a bit here, as making a simple ‘connect and go’ client eliminates the ability of customizing some of the settings every ordinary user likes to. In fact, the whole experience can be described as simply pushing the button to connect. Given this, Hotspot Shield deserves appraise for one of the best clients we’ve seen from an esthetic and usability point of view. FeaturesĮach company has its own way of doing things and that’s one of the wonders about testing different software, not only you get to know which you like the most, but you also learn about how the different companies focus in different aspects. But for those who are convinced and have already made up their minds, AnchorFree allows them to choose between three billing periods, or even a lifetime subscription. It’s possible to use the service for free in two ways: either by making use of the 7-day free trial of the full version upon installation, or the free version which comes with some restrictions. Likewise, the company’s desktop program for computers and the app for mobile devices are easy to use, though because of this we noticed the lack of some more advanced features. It is also the name of a VPN worth of appraisal, whose biggest positive points are the stability of the speed in the company’s servers scattered around the world and the attractive prices of their subscriptions. Hotspot Shield is brought to us by AnchorFree, an American company headquartered in California.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |