Personal VPN Stand-UP

texasheat

Ok, so i want to stand up a VPN for me and my friends. I have quite a bit of technology training from the US military and my contracting job. But i've never done this before. So I thought i'd hit up the experts. Here's the situation:

I want to host the VPN server, and have everyone connect to me. I need a program to do this, the only one i have any experience with is Cisco VPN, but i'm not buying that. I'm hoping to find a good free one, but don't really know where to start, any suggestions?

I will then need to configure the routers on all points for the connection. As i understand it, most routers don't allow VPN traffic, so i'll need to crack open some ports, I guess for this i'm really just hoping for a guide of some sort.

After that i should be good. My whole plan is to stand up a Minecraft server. But i want to get the connections established first before i try that next step. The VPN is where i need help, there plenty of guides on the Minecraft Forum for setup, but i need help with the connetion stuff.

Also, will i need to let my ISP know anything? For ex, i'm going through COX, will i need to tell them my router will be used for server?

Thanks in advance

bigwah

Most ISPs dont let you use VPN/Server stuff on consumer grade connections, requiring you to upgrade to business class. If they do, good for you, otherwise you'll need to upgrade.

Do you really need a VPN for a minecraft server? Seems a bit overkill, but I'm not a big minecraft guy.

Darmak

Yeah, I just run the Minecraft server software on my PC all the time and my friends and I come and go as we please. As long as you aren't trying to get like 20 people on there or anything you should be fine.

Oh, I should mention my PC specs are an i7 quad core, 8 gigs of RAM, and an AMD Radeon 6970

texasheat

Ok, maybe i'll look at just doing that. None the less, i'd like to look at all my options. Could either of you recommend a good program? My fear of doing just the standard connections is tbe hacking and greifing. I haven't looked into it yet, but i thought the standard connection made the server public. And if anyone knows the info, can connect....right? So the VPN would allow me to keep the Minecraft port's closed in my router, and allow my friends to authenticate through the VPN software. Maybe it is over kill, maybe i don't know what the hell i'm talking about. That's why i came to you guys. I'll look at server setup instructions, but i would still like to know a good free VPN software.

Aioua

You could set up an SSH server. (Some instructions...)
Assuming your friends are using windows, they'll need to use Putty or something, and set up SSH tunnels to connect to your minecraft server.