Extra features in VPN Unlimited

KeepSolid VPN Unlimited offers two free, and three paid additional features to its users, besides the basic VPN connections. The first is called KeepSolid Wise, which essentially masks your VPN connections as simple web traffic and helps bypass VPN blocks in countries like China. It is good to note that turning on KeepSolid Wise might decrease your speed. This feature can be turned on or off on the Network settings screen, accessible from the Account tab. Here you can also enable the Stop DNS Leak feature, which makes the application use only KeepSolid's DNS servers. It is highly recommended to leave this option turned on.

The second extra feature is the Censorship Test, accessible from the sidebar. This tests whether there are any websites blocked in your region and adds one day of subscription to your current plan.

Note that you can only run it once a week. Just press the Contribute button to run the test.

Once it's done, you can claim the extra day of subscription by clicking the Send the results button.

Additionally, you can also buy three extra features from KeepSolid - these can be purchased from your subscription information tab, accessible by clicking on the "n day(s) VPN left" button.

Here, you can buy or extend a VPN subscription (strangely, there are more options available than on the website) and buy three extra features:

• Additional slots: you can purchase the VPN service for another one, five or ten devices, for a month or a year

• Personal IP: you can buy your IP address, which can be handy if the shared IP addresses get blocked or throttled

• Personal Server: you can subscribe to your own VPN server that offers the highest possible speed, comes with priority support and a free VPN subscription

Note that there is a Protection tab available in the VPN Unlimited application that lets you configure the KeepSolid DNS Firewall feature that offers anti-malware, blocking of tracking and advertisement blocking. Although these features would make great extras, unfortunately, we were informed that they would be removed in the next six months.

KeepSolid VPN Unlimited has some useful extra features, the best being KeepSolid Wise. The Censorship Test is more like a small bonus program. Also, the additional slots, the Personal IP, and the Personal Server are extensions of the central VPN service and need to be purchased separately.

Advanced settings and configuration

VPN Unlimited has a few settings that can be configured and all of them can be accessed in the Account tab. Here you can change your account password, set the application to run at system startup and enable password protection. This makes the application ask for your account password on every startup, for enhanced security.

The Network settings button lets you configure the KeepSolid Wise feature, as discussed earlier, and you can also log out from your account on this screen.

The VPN Unlimited application on Windows has a few settings to be configured. While this makes things simple for beginners, advanced users will miss the advanced settings and customizability that other VPN vendors include.

Performance and speed

Whenever you are using a VPN service, your internet connection's speed decreases somewhat. This is because you are no longer connecting directly to the internet but through a VPN server. Of course, the speed loss depends on the VPN server and the VPN service as well. To check how much VPN Unlimited affects our internet connection's speed, we ran a couple of tests using the popular Speedtest.net service.

We were using VPN Unlimited on an internet connection that is advertised as having a speed of 100 Mbps for both download and upload. The screenshot below shows the rates measured by Speedtest.net before installing VPN Unlimited on our test computer. Although the speeds are not exactly what the ISP advertises, they are relatively close to 100 Mbps.

First, we used VPN Unlimited to establish a VPN connection to the fastest possible server, by choosing Optimal. This was in Chisinau, Moldova. There was quite a lot of speed loss: both download and upload speeds have decreased considerably and ping time was high as well.

Next, we went a bit further and chose a server on the same continent, but in a different country - Germany, Europe. Both speeds have increased to about 50 Mbps, meaning that the VPN server in Germany is much better than the one in Moldova.

For the following test, we chose a server on a different continent and in a popular location, the United States. The connection speed did not drop very much: the download speed was at about 50 Mbps and the upload about 32 Mbps, which is excellent.

Finally, we went all over to the other side of the world, to Australia. Here, the ping reply time was quite bad, but the download speed was remarkably good, above 25 Mbps, which is quite possibly the best we have ever seen for a VPN connection to Australia. The upload speed barely went over 3 Mbps though.

You should know that, whenever you use a VPN service, there will be some speed loss. Fortunately KeepSolid VPN Unlimited is speedy for a VPN service. Their servers in Western Europe and Australia are fast, although some servers in Eastern Europe did not quite live up to our expectations.

Default settings you might consider adjusting

There is not much to modify about VPN Unlimited's settings. However, here are a few tips to make the most out of the application:

• By default, VPN Unlimited starts up with your computer. You might not always need this, so disable it, to make your Windows boot faster.
• You should enable Password Protection to make sure that nobody tampers with the application.
• If you are located in a country where VPN services might be blocked, be sure to enable KeepSolid Wise.

KeepSolid VPN Unlimited has a small number of settings to change, and there is little you can enhance about the way it works. Beginners will love this.

Pros and cons

KeepSolid VPN Unlimited has the following positive features:

• The user interface is simple and easy to use

• KeepSolid VPN servers are usually quite fast

• The service is available on many platforms
• It has a 7-day free trial and another seven days of money back guarantee

There are some downsides to this VPN service as well:

• There are not many advanced settings to tinker with
• The firewall feature is a great extra, but it will be removed soon
• Some convenient features are missing, like automatic rules for new Wi-Fi networks

Verdict

KeepSolid VPN Unlimited provides what you expect from a VPN service: lots of VPN servers, good speed, a simple user interface which is easy to use for beginners as well, and some basic functions that enhance its usability. It is available on many platforms and configuring it takes no effort. However, advanced users will want more personalization options. KeepSolid VPN Unlimited is one of the best VPN services on the market, and an excellent choice for beginners and less technical users.