How To

I have lived in Japan now for about 6 years. There are some things that I miss in the US, but most of those I can either get here or at least have shipped here. While getting items shipped to Japan has gotten easier and cheaper, accessing US sites has become more difficult. The problem is that many sites are starting to monitor IP addresses and will block you if you aren’t accessing the site from within the US. This can be even more frustrating if you are trying to access a site you “have” to use like online banking. Luckily there is a way around this using VPN services.

VPN stands for Virtual Private Network, and is a way to connect your computer through a server that is located somehwere else. So even though I am located in Japan, the VPN makes it look as though I am connecting from in the US. As an added feature, my true location is hidden which means more security.

It is as easy as downloading the program, choosing the location you want to connect to, and going to the page you want to see. It’s also cheap. With a year subscription for the company I chose, it is a little under $7 a month. Not bad at all.

I went with a company called HMA (Hide My Ass) after comparing various companies and the value that each offered. I also like the name. HMA also seemed to be highly recommended on the web and had a 30 day money back guarantee. I had tried a free service a while back and it didn’t work to well. So far I have been really happy with HMA’s VPN.

You can check out the service yourself here: Hide My Ass VPN Service. If you choose to purchase using this link, you will also be helping out Simplistic Thoughts as I get a part of the sale.

Connecting your PS3, XBOX, and other devices through VPN 

Watching movies on my computer is okay, and I can even hook my computer up to watch them on the TV, but I really wanted to be able to use Netflix, Hulu, and other programs through the PS3. Running Netflix through the PS3 runs smoother than it does running it through the browser. It wasn’t bad through the browser, but I would occassionally have to wait for loading, while the PS3 has been perfect.

There are two ways to connect your PS3 or XBOX through a VPN service. The best method is to purchase a router that allows you to connect directly to a VPN service. There is a list on HMA’s router page. You can find it here. They also have instructions on how to hook it up. Once you connect your router to the VPN service, any device you connect to the router will be under that IP.

The second method is to connect directly through your computer and then share that connection with your PS3 or XBOX. This is much more complicated and not the best method, but will save you from having to purchase another router. I went this method, and it works now, but after several wasted hours I wish I would have just bought the router. If this sounds like the way you want to go, check out this page. It has the instructions on how to set it up.

It has been great being able to access Netflix and hulu and watch US TV again. If you are feeling the same way, sign up for 30 days. You can always cancel it later if you aren’t happy with it.

Hide My Ass VPN Service

Also, when you connect your PS3 through a VPN service you may need to change the DNS number on the PS3. Doing a quick search should bring up how to do this and what numbers to use. Now download the Netflix app on your PS3 and you should be all set.

Remember when you had to open another browser page to to open another website. You had to constantly flip back and forth between pages if you needed more than one page. Things got even more hectic if you needed three or more. Then came tabs. All of your webpages in one simple browser. They were all listed at the top and easy to see. Then they added the ability to reopen the tabs you had open when you closed your browser. Life got easier.

At least it did until I started using tabs as bookmarks. Everytime I wanted to look at a page later, I would just leave it open in a tab. After a few days I would end up with so many tabs I couldn’t find the the tabs I actually needed to use. Instead, I end up with a lot of wasted time clicking back and forth between tabs I forgot I even had.

A couple days ago I came across a solution. An add-on for Chrome and Firefox called TooManyTabs. The program allows you to save your tabs for later and move them out of view. It sits as an icon on your browser and allows you to have many pages open for later, but keep them out of sight. It doesn’t have a lot of features, but I think that is actually what I like about it. It’s really simple.

However, after using it for a few days, I realized something else: I really don’t need all those extra tabs anyways. If I don’t have time to look at that site now, I am probably not going to look at it later either. I do still use TooManyTabs, but not as much as I thought. Instead, I just limit the number of tabs that I am allowed to keep open to five. At the moment I have four tabs open. One of those is my e-mail and one is this post that I am writing right now.

I use TooManyTabs to store pages that I have to use on a regular basis for work, but don’t need open all the time. Websites that I work on on everyday or every couple days. By keeping them closed most of the time, I save myself a lot of time having to search through a bunch of tabs.

So, if you like to have a lot of tabs open then get the add-on, but realistically you can probably get the same effect by just realizing that you don’t need all those pages open in the first place.