How to setup PPTP VPN Client connection

What is VPN?

A virtual private network (VPN) is a computer network that uses a public telecommunication infrastructure such as the Internet to provide remote offices or individual users with secure access to their organization’s network. It aims to avoid an expensive system of owned or leased lines that can be used by only one organization.

It encapsulates data transfers between two or more networked devices which are not on the same private network so as to keep the transferred data private from other devices on one or more intervening local or wide area networks. There are many different classifications, implementations, and uses for VPNs.

What can we do with VPN?

1. To hide the users’ true IP address
   When using VPN connections, your client machine’s IP address will be hidden and your remote server (VPN server)’s IP address will be shown.
2. Secure data transferred over the internet
   Most of the VPN will have the option to encrypt the data and thus they are safer to be transferred over the internet. This is especially good for company use.
3. Access sites that are blocked in certain regions
   China is a very good example. Facebook, YouTube, Flickr and so many more websites are blocked in the country and people have to use different methods to bypass the restriction and VPN is one of the common way to achieve what they want.

How to setup VPN client

– On Windows XP

Click on “Network Connections” in Control Panel

Click “Create a new connection” in Network Tasks panel

Hit “Next“

Choose “Connect to the network at my workplace” and “Next”

Then choose “Virtual Private Network connection“

Give a name to this VPN connection

Enter the hostname of IP address of the VPN network

And you are done, the next step is key in your VPN username and password

Whenever you want to connect to VPN, just dial the connection.

– On Windows Vista/7

Click on the connection icon in the task bar, and choose “Open Network and Sharing Center”

Then “Set up a new connection or network“, and “Next”

Then “Connect to a workplace“, and “Next”

Choose “Use my Interne connection (VPN)”

Then key in your VPN IP address and give it a name

Then next step is to key in your VPN account info

And you are done

When you want to connect to the VPN network, just click on the same internet icon in the task bar and connect to the VPN

– On Macintosh OS X

Open “System Preference“, then click on “Network”

Click on the “+” under the network connection list, and choose “VPN” for Interface, “PPTP” for VPN Type, and give your VPN service a name.

The next is to assign server address and account username to this service.

Click on the “Authentication Setting…” and key in your password, however, this step could be skipped if you would like to key in your password every time you make the connection.

When you finished all these by clicking “OK“, you can “Connect” to this VPN service.

–On Linux (Ubuntu)

Note: There are just way too many Linux versions, for Linux 2.6 and above, I take Ubuntu 10.10 as an example to show how to make the VPN connection.

Click the Internet icon on the menu bar, and then choose “VPN Connections –> Configure VPN”

Click on “Add“

Choose “Point-to-Point Tunneling Protocol (PPTP)” as the VPN Connection Type

Give your VPN connection a name and assign all the necessary information

Make sure you check “Use Point-to-Point encryption (MPPE)” in the “Advanced” configure panel

Then you can connect to VPN in the menu bar and your Internet icon will have a lock when the connection is successful.

– On iPhone

Tab the “Settings” icon

Choose “General“

Choose “Network“

Tap on “VPN“

Switch VPN setting from “Off” to “On“

In the VPN type bar, choose “PPTP“, and input the VPN connection info

Description: The name of the VPN connection

Server: VPN hostname or IP address

Account: VPN username

Password: VPN password

Now back to “Settings” interface and you should be able to see the VPN switch

Whenever you want to make the VPN connection, just simply switch “VPN” from “off” to “On”. and you will see a blue VPN icon on the title bar.

Post Note:

This post is about settings on VPN clients, if you want to set up the VPN server, you may want to take a look at my previous post on how to set up PPTP VPN on CentOS easily.

I would like to show you how to set it up on Android as well initially, but too bad I have no access to Android phone at this moment. Maybe I will append one more section to this post later on if I have access to Android phone. Stay tuned!