Your Opinions on Forums

[Stormraven]

Hello Everyone,

I've decided to put a forum on my website, and would just like to have your opinion on two of the free forums I have found, please vote on which one you would choose. And please give a reason, other than that if you choose 'other' please state which one your talking about but only free ones please.

Kind Regards
Stormraven

[crackafaza]

I don't see any poll :S or any options :S

[Stormraven]

Originally Posted by crackafaza

I don't see any poll :S or any options :S

I didn't think it would post the thread until i had sorted out the poll options but it did lol. Poll options have now been added so please give me your thoughts please

[crackafaza]

Haha, oh well happens to the best of us I!

I have used both of these before, and whereas I don't like either really, I would suggest going for paid software = vbulletin, as I think that is the best in the business, but as you are looking for a free forum, out of the two I definately prefer PHPBB.

Just for the simple fact it is easier to change, well when I say easier I like to change the look of a website/forum using my favourite program but with SMF you can't do this, you have to change the look in the admin area. Whereas this is good for some people, it just doesn't work for me.

[Stormraven]

But why is vbulliten better? they all do the same thing and are similar.

thankyou for your opinion mate, very appreciated

[saltedm8]

I have to agree with crackafaza, even though its not free, vbulletin from what i can see is the best choice, it has more features than the rest, it tries harder to be more search engine friendly, you have more control over it and your members and lastly, but far from least its very easy to install, upgrade and mod...

[Stormraven]

Originally Posted by saltedm8

I have to agree with crackafaza, even though its not free, vbulletin from what i can see is the best choice, it has more features than the rest, it tries harder to be more search engine friendly, you have more control over it and your members and lastly, but far from least its very easy to install, upgrade and mod...

But its £50 a year knowing my luck no one will join and ill be £50 for nothing lol. what sort of features does vbulliten have that others dont?

[saltedm8]

http://www.vbulletin.com/features.php and its not £50.00 per year if you do what i did and get the 'owned licence',

I am pretty sure you can ask for a trial too, you should already know most the features anyway, webforumz is built on it

also, here is a quick screenshot of the admin panel http://www.wowinsider.com/media/2008...vbulletin2.jpg
i found that in the search engines

[AnsUK]

Personally i prefer IPB. It is expensive to buy, around $150 but then its like $25 per year after. Personally i find it more user friendly and intuitive than VB. Free wise i would go with phpbb simply because it has a larger community but im not really into open source software.

[Bocaj]

For simplicity i like punbb, it's easy to skin and mod, however seo wise you'll probably have to do alot of work yourself.

I've not used any forum software for a long time, so punbb may have gone into the ground, or far advanced from what i remember.

[partyon]

Ive used phpbb before and now on vBulletin. We made the choice to switch over for numerous reasons and 100% glad with the results. You pay for what you get.

[simonb]

You can try there demo, well worth do it.

I would spend your money on vb, people are more lucky to join.

[Aso]

I've got on quite well with bbPress recently. It's from the same guys behind Wordpress, but admittedly it's still in development stages.

It is very basic regarding features and what-not, but it's extremely lightweight, and quick and easy to develop and skin (especially if you're used to 'theming' Wordpress).

Plus it integrates beautifully with WP if you already have a blog and fancy having a mini-community too!