Control Panel Setup

Once you’ve purchased a server it takes around 3-4 minutes for an email to arrive with
details to access the control panel. After logging in you’ll be greeted by this page:

If you scroll down, you’ll want to make sure TUN/TAP is turned on (It’ll most likely be off by
default)

I’d also recommend adding a new hostname and a strong root password.

Now is when I reinstalled the system OS to make sure all those changes have updated. This
can be done via the reinstall button
Now I’d normally use Ubuntu cause that’s what I’m most familiar with however after trying
multiple times with no success I quickly gave up on Ubuntu and tried Cent OS. The first few
attempts didn’t work but now I’ve got it working with “CentOS 7 64bit Minimal”

So, pick that one then click “reinstall” at the bottom. You’ll be asked to confirm and then
you’ll need to wait for around 5 minutes before doing anything.

SSH into VPS

Now you should be able to SSH into your VPS. Big thing to note is the port

ssh root@???.???.???.??? -p ?????

This should now just give you an SSH window logged in as root.

Installing OpenVPN

The first thing that is recommended is a quick update (which might take a while… mine had
271 updates to run)

yum update

Then fetch the script for installing OpenVPN

wget [Link]
install/master/[Link] -O [Link]

Then give the script permissions to run

chmod +x [Link]
and finally run the script

bash ./[Link]

You should get something that looks like this:

(It’ll most likely auto fill with the internal IP address and which point I just pressed enter)

It’ll then ask for the Public IPv4 address (this can be found at link provided in the initial setup
email)

It’ll then check for IPv6 compatibility and whilst you could run it on IPv6, I said no because
neither my fixed ISP or mobile phone plan supports IPv6 so it’s pointless to me.

Then you need to specify the port you wish to use

The setup email will provide a link to your external IP as well as a list of the ports you have
access to. This will look something like: “Port Range : XXXXX to XXXXX”

Make sure you tell the OpenVPN server you wish to specify a port (Option 2)

and then you need to specify the exact port you want to use (pick one from your range):
Most of the other questions will be the default option where it’ll auto fill the value for you

Select number 1 for UDP:

Pick a DNS provider… you can use the default server one or use something like Google or
Cloudflare. Cloudflare (number 3) is the default and uses the [Link] server which you can
read more about here [Link]

Select no to compression:

no to custom encryption settings:

It will the display the following message at which point you just press any key and then wait
for the install

After a minute it will ask for a client name. You can use anything but I’ve just called mine
“main”
You’ll then be asked if you want to add a password for the client. Whilst the default is a
passwordless client, I’d recommend using a password that way if anyone ever gets hold of
your connection file, they’ll still need a password to connect to your VPN server.

It will then ask for the password twice (2nd time to verify).

The server installation is now complete!

You can check the server status using the command

systemctl status openvpn@server

This should spit out that the server is now running:

Connecting to the server

In the process of installing the server you’ve just created a connection profile called
[Link] which is saved in the main root directory.

You should be able to see both the install script and the connection file by using the list
directory command

ls

Which should display the following:

You now need the [Link] file on your desktop or phone to connect. Unlike many other
VPS servers there is no pre-installed FTP server which makes it harder to get that file and
whilst you could setup a FTP server and port forward, I’m lazy and don’t want to deal with
the extra install involved in that process. Instead I’m just going to copy the text out of the
install file. If you have SCP access you could use that however I’m not sure if it’ll work with
the limited ports available.
Being such a light OS there isn’t text editor installed but you can install nano

yum install nano

This will ask you if the download size (around 1.6MB is ok) so just enter y

It should only take a few seconds and it’ll then say “complete!”

It’s now possible to open the OVPN configuration file with nano by entering

nano [Link]

You’ll be greeted by the following which you can copy and paste into a text editor. I’m using
sublime text and make sure you scroll down to capture it all. Make sure you don’t copy the
same line twice as it needs to match exactly (scroll down will still show some of the lines that
you may have previously copied). Mine has 78 lines and it should be the same assuming
you’ve entered a password for the configuration file.

Once done you can exit the nano editor by pressing Control-X

Save this file from your text editor making sure to use the same name and extension .ovpn as
its saved on the VPS.

Now you can open the file using your preferred OpenVPN client. On a Mac I use Tunnelblick
however you can also a Mac or Windows client from the OpenVPN website
[Link]
or use the mobile apps for iOS or Android.
Tunnelblick prompts if you wish to install for all users or just yourself (your preference) and
then after pressing connect you’ll be asked for the profile password you setup during install.

It should then be connected via your VPS server:

Status and Control Commands

If you want to stop the OpenVPN server use:

systemctl stop openvpn@server

If you want to start the OpenVPN server use:

systemctl start openvpn@server

If you want to restart the OpenVPN server use:

systemctl restart openvpn@server

If you want to check the OpenVPN server is running use:

systemctl status openvpn@server

Finally, on such a small server performance is often important. In standby (sleep mode)
OpenVPN uses around 4% of the memory and 0% of the CPU.

This can be viewed by using the top command:

top
This will show something like this:

To quit this screen just press q

With a single user connected this increase to around 0.3% of the CPU and still around 4% of
the memory. Under a heavier load (a [Link] speedtest pulling 18mbps) this increases to
around 7% of the CPU.