VBulletin vs. phpBB

I've got a phpBB forum running on my site (http://www.downsizeme.com/phpBB/) and as much as I like phpBB, there's just something about Vbulletin that attracts me.

Some of the features that I want are view new posts, mark all forums read, relative time stamps, better cookie control and preview post.

While the cost of Vbulletin seems a bit much ($85 per year!) it seems worth it just to get those features.

Has anyone ever migrated from phpBB to Vbulletin? How easy was it? Do you feel that the cost associated with the board is worth it?

Any & all comments are welcome.

WackyMan

[spyres]

If you can wait a little while *a few months probably* Version 2.0 of phpBB pretty much will have all those features you want. But if ya want to spend the cash for vBulletin...

Yeah, I've been reading about phpBB v.20 on phpbb.com & area51.phpbb.com -- it seems that it'll resolve most of the issues v1.4 has been having...

Will it be the free Vbulletin killer that we all hope it'll be?

That's the burning question.

[petesmc]

vBulletin is either 85 a year or a flat 160 fee which is what i got which means i have it for ever, but only upgrades for one year.

You can check all the features out at my forums and i think that is vBulletin has competition then they'd quickly wipe them away.

http://forum.codingclick.com

[spyres]

vBulletin has a *lot* of features that a lot of people would probably never use. It's a great program, but what happens if phpBB 2.0 comes in with 80%-90% of the features, but none of the price? Why not wait 'til 2.0 phpBB comes out and evaluate that before you lock yourself to paying for vbulletin. Even if you buy the unlimited vbulletin for $160, you still need to pay$30/yr after the first year if you want any further support or upgrades....

Yeah, the price stinks...plus it's kinda ridiculous to have to pay that much for support.

But you know how the old saying goes, "You get what you pay for"? The opposite is also true...a higher price sometimes leads people to believe that it's better quality.

For instance, if I bought a Mercedes for $100k, everyone would say, "Damn...what an awesome car."

But if I got one for $15k, everyone would wonder what's wrong with it.

So part of me wants to know what I'm missing by not having Vbulletin.

Wacky

[CosmoDNA]

Well, you're not missing $85

Just because someone charges money for something doesn't necessarily make it better...but I guess there's a certain sense of control if you pay for something. At least if you pay for vbulletin and the support people don't help you can yell, "What the hell am I paying for!?"

[spyres]

If the features your mentioned are all you really need, then wait for phpBB as it will contain them. If you see lots of features that you need and will actually use with vBulletin, then by all means purchase it. My point is that very few forums admins need or use even a fraction of what vBulletin has to offer...

Originally posted by spyres
If the features your mentioned are all you really need, then wait for phpBB as it will contain them. If you see lots of features that you need and will actually use with vBulletin, then by all means purchase it. My point is that very few forums admins need or use even a fraction of what vBulletin has to offer...

Good deal. I guess that answers my questions.

[MX3D]

I use XMB forums. I have had it with phpBB personally. Tons of errors, extremely ugly unless you hack the hell out of it (which can be a pain to do) etc. www.xmbforums.com is very small, looks great, and runs EXTREMELY fast. I asked my forum members if they wanted phpBB, and they ALL said they liked XMB much better.

I do plan on getting VB though. All of those boards, that means phpBB, XMB etc, have little problems here and there, which VB doesnt have. If its a huge site and you have a large forum, I'd definetly get VB, but if your like me, have a small community and its not THAT big of a deal, I'd stick to phpBB or XMB.

[RevKev]

I dunno... I installed phpBB last week. Took me only about 15min to get it installed and running like I wanted. An hour later, I had all the colors, backgrounds and stuff set up. A little later I had even hacked some of the links to make it more user friendly. I don't exactly have a ton of people posting all day long, yet, but from a setup standpoint, it was no problem. I definitely spent a LOT more time fretting about which board to use than actually getting one running. Maybe it's not as big a deal as we're all making it out to be?

[spyres]

It's pretty easy to setup phpBB to make it look like you want. It's got a themes setup that lets you make multiple themes that your users can choose from if they don't like the default. I had zero experience with php scripts and mysql and I had it up and running in about 20 minutes. Getting it setup with a theme took around another 10...

[MX3D]

Personally I would go with XMB forum. The Beta 1.0 came out, with lots of new features, fixes, runs very fast, easy to use and customize etc.

[4SeeN]

that xmb link don't work

The XMB link is http://www.xmbforum.com

W

[spyres]

...is pretty good, but it isn't as good internally as phpBB. It has a lot of stuff still hardcoded and hasn't been tested as extensively as phpBB. It's good and will get better, but with phpBB 2.0 coming out in a few months, I'd wait....

[whyspers]

My vote would go to wwwthreads. This is the best board I have found anywhere!


Laura

[SWFan]

Originally posted by whyspers
My vote would go to wwwthreads. This is the best board I have found anywhere!


Laura

LOL

[delemtri]

blah, nobody writes their own stuff anymore, hehe.

[SilentKnight]

I like vB personally. It is more expensive, but the customization is superb, you can cahnge anything you want, without hacking the code. I definitely like that.