Ive been using PandaPow for a while now. Complete technophobe so it's easy to use for me and is reliable, excellent customer service too.

Use it mainly for streaming sports and generally works well.

After reading your post, I ran some speed tests as well, and determined that their HK servers really are the best (by a considerable margin) from Shanghai. It just requires patience in order to establish a connection.

VPN in China
 

So here's a question from a newbie when it comes to VPN's. Totally no idea!

The travel china website is indicating that we cannot use Google+, Facebook, Gmail, etc. while in China unless we have a VPN.

I'm going to be in China for 13 days in January and really would like access to all which includes doing a blog for family and friends.

Can someone assist me ?

Thanks

Get a VPN.
What device will you be using? A computer, tablet or smartphone or all?

I will be using a surface pro 3 tablet, and possibly a smartphone.

As mentioned, I'm a newbie when it comes to this stuff. Is there a place where I can download this VPN or do I have to get it in China?

Most commercial VPNs make it fairly easy to download their APPs and get up and running from within China, but it is much simpler to set yourself up overseas, especially if any of your devices are Android because Google Play is blocked in China.

After the more recent Google block, how has the VPN service been for gmail? I've used PIA in the past, but my cousin is going into Jiangsu for a week next week and is looking for a temporary VPN for about 2 weeks. What is the best short-term one for him?

The one this thread is officially about has a free 30-day trial I believe.

Gmail on vpn on desktop is stable. On my phone, my push notifications are not working as well, so I need to refresh occasionally.

tb

Express has been working really well for me recently, and I think you get the first month free (I.e pay first then cancel).

Next question, do I really only need it for travelling in China, or should I keep it for the 5 months of travelling?

Where else are you traveling? (The complete block of Google apps seems to be unique to China.)

We will be travelling around SE Asia, then into Australia, New Zealand, etc.

The VPN might come in handy if you will be visiting Vietnam and want to access facebook from there.

Great, will try ExpressVPN for connection in Guangzhou, China for the next two weeks.

Does anyone have any advice on how to buy short-term internet access just in case my host's internet doesn't work out for me? (They told me it might be very slow). How would buying internet work for a PC laptop (Windows 7) and a tablet (iPad 2)?

I have a mifi with 10g of data remaining that I'd be happy to send you (because my current phone plan renders it obsolete), but buying a Unicom 4g SIM yourself is probably easier.

Regarding Express (since this thread is about them), here's my latest report:
1. Hong Kong 1 is still their best server (by far), but it can be hard to maintain a connection at times
2. My back ups are Los Angeles and Los Angeles 3
-far slower than Hong Kong 1, but more reliable
3. Run speed tests with them every 3 or 4 days; a dark horse like Malaysia may well be close to the top
4. Their tech support is pretty awesome, but IME, whenever they provide me with specific DNS addresses, I get great results for about 8 hours... after that, it's completely useless
5. My networking expert friend in Shenzhen says
-no commercial VPNs are as smart as Beijing's censors
-even if I built my own VPN with our Tokyo server, they would nail me (because they screen for packets themselves)