I've used/Administered Phpbb forums going on 4 years and only recently bought a licence for a Vbulletin forum and I have to say it was money well spent.

I used to praise Phpbb and I still do as a free forum software it is a great option, but I have found lately that Phpbb boards are easily spammed no matter what you do. That's not to say Vbulletin aren't, I am just discovering that I have more control with my Vbulletin software.

By far IMO Vbulletin wins hands down.

What are other peoples opinons?

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I spent about 2 weeks on phpBB, before i upgraded to vBulletin, worth every penny. so much more control.

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vBulletin is the best forum software, IMO. The control, flexibility, and features that vBulletin offers are outstanding.

Chris

Not only is vB just better, but it brings with it some sense of prestige. Most good forums use vB (not all, but most) and as a result, members tend to be used to its features. When members are already used to how your forum works before they even click the register button, you get a huge advantage.

Also on the prestige, forum owners especially like vB forums because its a 99% accurate way to see if the admin is devoted to the forum. You don't spend $100+ on software for a forum you don't care about.

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spent 2 1/2 years on phpbb2 and switched to vb, since I've bought 2 licenses and a whole slew of vBulletin paid hacks..

I love it

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I really like vbulletin, it's definitely money well spent. It's very user-friendly and also very admin-friendly. With phpbb, there is a lot of modding required to get many of the features vB has built-in.

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vBulletin, yes is neat. But you've really got to ask- What do you want to do? If you want a small forum than phpBB is perfect. Infact, if you don't have enough money. phpBB is a very capable forum tool. Have a look at www.dojodesign.ro - and especially morrowind.ro for an example of what power phpBB has

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That is a fun contest for vBulletin... they already are better.. PhpBB you have to install over 900 mods to be good like vBulletin...

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I have administrated a vBulletin forum for a while, and phpbb for about a year. phpbb is not even the best free software out there in my opinion. I like vBulletin, but i find it seems to get too much praise just because it is paid. I have SMF now, and I love the way it is set up, the package manager, and all other parts, and I've had the least amount of bots with SMF as well.
Only thing that phpbb had over smf was the amount of mods, but SMF is growing quickly. Seems like everything for vB costs money though, and I dont see having a free forum as not being dedicated to the forum, but in someways smart. For example: Say you just LOVE Chevy, own a chevy forum or something, you don't have to go buy a Corvette ZO6 to prove you love chevy because its the most expensive option.

I like vBulletin, and if it were less money, I would run it because as said above, many people are familiar with it.

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I agree that you don't need the best software to be called a good forum. But to have a good forum you need quality posts and very good members. Nothing to do with software, well to extent anyway!

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Just Gareth Marketing, Making Money and Promotion
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