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VPN Location in Mainland China?


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Just paid for a month of ExpressVPN so we can watch Olympics from inside China via CCTVx.

 

Only can find Hong Kong ... and the speeds are too slow to be useful.

Anybody:

 

1. . . . . know a VPN location inside China that we can connect to and maybe help things along. Or,

 

2. . . accomplishing this some other way? I think Dish has a China package (no, I don't have Dish).

 

 

Thanks for any tips,
Greg

 

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I'm using Los Angeles 3 for now - the speed is pretty good, and I'm able (usually) to watch streaming video.

 

As a VPN location inside China wouldn't do anything for you, since it wouldn't get past the Great Firewall.

 

A VPN won't speed anything up - it's a definite bottleneck on TOP of the Great Wall bottleneck.

 

From the ExpressVPN start-up screen, you can select the Options menu. The Speed Test will tell you which location is the fastest from where you are

 

But CCTV5 and CCTV HD are available without a VPN. I don't know if they still have it, but there used to be an app you could install on your PC to receive CCTV stations. I used to use that when they dropped CCTV 9. There's always cable TV.

 

The Dish option that would do that is the 'Sling Box', which 'slings' your feed to a remote location. My guess is that that won't work adequately in China.

Edited by Randy W (see edit history)
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Thanks, I think you figured out I am out of china and we wanted to see China coverage of some Olympics.

 

The only location available to me near China is Hong Kong and that is not good enough (blocked).

 

So, if someone was OUT of China and wanted to VPN into China, how would that person do it?

 

I am downloading the PPTV app for my Mac laptop from the Apple App store. Will see what we can do with that.

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Thanks, I think you figured out I am out of china and we wanted to see China coverage of some Olympics.

 

The only location available to me near China is Hong Kong and that is not good enough (blocked).

 

So, if someone was OUT of China and wanted to VPN into China, how would that person do it?

 

I am downloading the PPTV app for my Mac laptop from the Apple App store. Will see what we can do with that.

 

 

There may BE a way - I've talked before about the Reverse Great Firewall, which blocks some Chinese sites from the outside world, but I don't recall anyone talking about a need to find a way around it.

 

No, I assumed you were in China. The PPTV app may do it. Dish has a Great Wall package of Chinese stations, as does DirecTV.

 

Yes, Hong Kong is outside the Great Firewall and won't work for that.

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CCTV APP for iPad. Could give that a try.

央视影音HD-畅享奥运会 by CCTV.COMhttps://appsto.re/us/Vz0tx.i

 

 

The SAME app is available for Android and PC. The question is - will it work outside of the Great Firewall? If not, one of the VPN servers hosted in China may be needed.

As in here in the USA? It works for me n the states, using to watch CCTV programming.

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CCTV APP for iPad. Could give that a try.

央视影音HD-畅享奥运会 by CCTV.COMhttps://appsto.re/us/Vz0tx.i

 

The SAME app is available for Android and PC. The question is - will it work outside of the Great Firewall? If not, one of the VPN servers hosted in China may be needed.

As in here in the USA? It works for me n the states, using to watch CCTV programming.

 

 

 

 

Yes - that's exactly what the question was. Then all he needs is the PPTV app, which he was already downloading for his Mac.

 

What threw me off initially was when he said "so we can watch Olympics from inside China", which I thought meant that THEY were inside China.

Edited by Randy W (see edit history)
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So, being fed up with the advertising and, more so, the time delay of everything - including the opening ceremony - Mrs Greg decided we should pay for a month of VPN so we could tunnel back into China to see live Olympics - probably on CCTV 5.

 

So, I added a month to ExpressVPN which I hadn't used since last fall when in China. The closest VPN server we could find was Hong Kong- We found out that HK is no more inside mainland than is Los Angeles. So, money wasted. R sent some links and I did find a few providers that could connect me to an internal server - but, seeing as I had already paid for ExpressVPN and also having read comments that the few providers who can put you back in China also need a hefty surcharge to pay for the higher price of a service in China. So, I didn't go for that.

PPTV: can't get internal content from China - despite having a VIP account. IQIYI could not help either. The CCTV app for ipad does, at least, work, but CCTV5 is only showing a tennis tournament from Toronto. Other live feeds do not work from it.

 

So, I learned VPN can only help when linked directly to a mainland VPN server - of which there are a few - though users have commented that by the time you are connected there the speed is too slow.

 

The Xiaomi TV box available through Amazon runs an Android system and, somehow, can connect you to internal channels. Don't have one - but the reviews still claim they are functional in this way.

 

The Dish Great Wall package: is not listing CCTV5 and I don't have Dish anyway. I think CCTV5 is necessary.

 

Also, sites that will stream low resolution sporting events are not working anymore - let's see: My service provider is Comcast, Comcast owns NBC, NBC owns the Olympics ...

 

not sure anybody would have such a stream anyway.

Well, like happened to me with MLB: it's not on TV anymore. I probably will not see it unless the World Series grabs my interest for some reason. Otherwise, weekends seem to fine to stay inside.

Thanks for tips. We'll see if we eventually get a Xiaomi box someday - always assumed we would if an MIL were to come stay.

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We did get in with a VPN called "unblockcn" and, while we could get some live tv, during Olympics hours we could only get a spinning wheel. No stream.

 

 

Not surprising - I will almost always download videos first before trying to watch them (of course, I'm going the other direction). I would NEVER subscribe to a streaming service and expect to get watchable quality out of it.

 

Even so, during the Olympics, I'm getting some pretty good download speeds (8MB or 9MB ) - maybe 3 times what it usually is. I hope it continues. The download speed usually varies between 0MB and around 3MB.

 

Rio Olympic hours here are pretty much 9 or 10 PM and later - we generally just see reruns of what was on the previous day. I have no idea what the overnight (live) coverage is. You might try the regular (China) waking hours to see if you get a better stream.

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  • 1 year later...

from the SCMP - getting around the REVERSE Great Firewall

 

These apps put users behind China’s internet firewall, even as millions of Chinese want to get out

 

The plethora of shows available on the mainland is partly due to cash-rich Chinese platforms investing heavily in video and music that is offered free of charge to locals to boost their user base.
However, because this content has been licensed from the copyright owners for distribution within China only, the apps detect the location of the user, notifying those outside China that they cannot access the programmes due to copyright restrictions.
However, a number of developers saw a business opportunity and have launched apps to help overseas users obtain a mainland IP address, using similar technology that VPN apps adopt to help mainland residents obtain a foreign IP to get around the Great Firewall.

 

. . .

 

“I am a soccer fan, but Hong Kong television stations charge a lot of money for the package. It is completely different from the mainland where TV stations and their apps always broadcast these programmes free of charge. So I have been searching for ways to ‘return to the mainland’ for the free and most up-to-date programmes,” Ma told the South China Morning Post.
In recent years, mobile apps in China have also bought broadcast rights to popular sports games to broaden their user base. Tencent Video, the mobile video-platform backed by Shenzhen-based technology giant Tencent, bought mainland Chinese online broadcasting rights for the 2016 Rio Olympics, as well as several popular European Football Leagues.

 

 

The apps mentioned are Transocks and N2ping

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  • 1 year later...

from Inkstone

 

more on the Reverse Firewall

 

Why I go out of my way to log back into the Chinese internet

 

 

Unblock Youku has close to 2.5 million users, according to statistics on the Chrome Web Store.
Transocks, a two-year-old China-based VPN service, serves close to 10 million devices worldwide, the company said in an interview with the Australian Broadcasting Corporation.
While there is no reliable estimate of how many Chinese expats are using such services, the Chinese-language VPN review site VPNDada.com revealed that there is significant demand.
“Although the original purpose of our website is to test and review VPN services for people in China to bypass China’s internet censorship, we have also been getting a lot of traffic from people searching for a VPN service to get into China,” a spokesperson told me over email.

 

 

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from Inkstone

 

more on the Reverse Firewall

 

Why I go out of my way to log back into the Chinese internet

 

 

Unblock Youku has close to 2.5 million users, according to statistics on the Chrome Web Store.
Transocks, a two-year-old China-based VPN service, serves close to 10 million devices worldwide, the company said in an interview with the Australian Broadcasting Corporation.
While there is no reliable estimate of how many Chinese expats are using such services, the Chinese-language VPN review site VPNDada.com revealed that there is significant demand.
“Although the original purpose of our website is to test and review VPN services for people in China to bypass China’s internet censorship, we have also been getting a lot of traffic from people searching for a VPN service to get into China,” a spokesperson told me over email.

 

 

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