That $200 VPN router saved my bacon in a Vietnamese coffee shop

I spent $200 on a travel router with built-in VPN support last year. Set it up in Ho Chi Minh City and it kept my banking secure on public WiFi. A few weeks ago the cafe network had a fake login page trying to steal passwords. My router blocked it and I didn't even notice until the owner told me. Worth every penny for the peace of mind alone. Anyone else running a dedicated router on the road?

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james_singh72mo ago

That's a solid setup but just a heads up - a $200 router might be overkill for most people. I've been running a $40 GL.iNet travel router with WireGuard for about 18 months now and it's handled everything from sketchy hostel WiFi in Bangkok to airport hotspots in Singapore. Your mileage may vary of course, and the extra cost might get you better range or faster speeds in some places, but the core VPN protection is usually the same. The fake login page blocking thing sounds more like a built-in adblocker or DNS filtering doing the work, not the VPN itself. Still, any router that keeps you off those phishing pages is doing its job.

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terry_wood512mo ago

Wait, $40 for a GL.iNet with WireGuard? I had no idea they went that cheap. Mine was like $80 and I thought I was getting a steal. Are you running the stock firmware or did you flash something on it? Honestly the fake login page blocking is what sold me on the whole setup too. I've seen those phishing pages in coffee shops in five different countries now, they look way too legit for the average tourist to spot.

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