I installed a VPN on My Router Just To Regret it

Dude, Not all VPN routers are created equal

My experience with Vilfo VPN router

⚠️ Not a paid review⚠️

I use ExpressVPN & surfshark. I recently got the Vilfo VPN router in November 2022. When compared with other so-called VPN consumer routers WITH QUAD-CORE CPUs(likely from broadcom) from Netgear/ASUS, this still won with it's 2013 CPU.

Here is my take on the Vilfo VPN router.

I was looking for a router/switch solution for VPN while using my ISP’s pretty decent router and extender as tri-band access points.

Turns out when contacting customer service at ExpressVPN their router actually tops out on average at 180 Mbps VPN & wired. 🤨


After doing some research, I settle on taking a chance with Vilfo VPN router fyi pronounced “Wilfo”. Reviews are mixed for it in the past but In my opinion they’ve got a lot of the kinks out of their OS especially with 1.3.0 which is the version I updated to upon receiving it.



Unlike past reviews, As of November 2022, setup was smooth for me. One of the reasons I purchased this device was The fact that it supports multiple providers not just ExpressVPN. As well as the hardware



Here are some pros and cons I found with Vilfo:



PROs:



-1.4 GHz dual-core Celeron processor(designed for a laptop or mini PC)

(Note: OpenVPN is single-threaded as stated by the Vilfo site (from some light research Lightway is currently single-threaded ))

-website says 16GB SSD for storage but I received 32GB SSD

-2GB of RAM



-each ethernet port has a dedicated 1 Gbit controller according to the disassembly on techpowerup



-multi-vendor support with custom OpenVPN and Wireguard support for those not listed

-split tunneling, grouping different devices to separate VPN or non-VPN link group(s), Port forwarding, multiple options for email notifications for events, Killswitch, utilization and bandwidth statistics , etc



-regular OS updates with roadmap and transparency on their site

-Personal testings:

-251.6 mbps from Maryland to a New Jersey ExpressVPN server to speed test server

-Instead of a speed test, I made multiple downloads on surfshark via their wireguard server in Ashburn, VA from Maryland 606.6 Mbps(72.32MB/s)
(Note: it might be faster as downloads completed before reaching Max)

-separate VPN server built-in allowing for more secure access anywhere back to your home network (support for windows, and Linux, and Android)

Note: for me this was a huge plus as I haven’t been hit once since using it as my Synology NAS was getting hit with hundreds of hacker attempts a year. (They do however allow you but do not recommend opening the REMOTE WAN BUT RATHER USING THE VPN SERVER which to be honest is a whole lot easier as you get local area access as if you’re in the house. Services on my Synology that gave me trouble accessing via internet now behave as if I’m locally there. 😎

CONs:

-Only OpenVPN & Wireguard

(no Lightway at least not yet as it’s fairly new and hasn’t gained much traction)

-As mentioned even by Vilfo: Wi-Fi sucks and recommend using your old router or a better one as a access point while using this router as the gateway

-Only (3) LAN ports & (1) WAN port.

In my case I have a 10 port Cisco small business switch already

-cost $400

Likely breakdown:

The unit: $280

DHL shipping $20

1 yr Home Pro subscription $99

(I think they put the subscription in to support themselves as they update more frequently than most vendors in my opinion.)

Great video! Always was interested in this topic (cause I have such feature on my router) and as always, it was simple and interesting. Keep up the good work 😉