Anyone have any thoughts on which is better and why. I'm looking to start a new forum and am interested in possibly trying vBulletin this time. Is it worth the money?
You get what you pay for. Cheepos get viruses day in and day out while people who get the quality script (vBulletin) hardly ever do. Upgrading phpVIRUS doesn't get rid of them, a new one comes out almost weekly!!!
well before trying of vbulleting i would have said PHPbb because its free, open sourced etc etc but now i own a vbull forum i can see the difference in quality already. Its much more user-friendly and nice bunch of options to play around with Another vote 4 vBulletin
As someone who has used both...phpbb. Starting out is easier with phbb as it's FREE. There are tons of mods for it to beef it up. VB is crap imho. Most VB sites look exactly the same vs phpbb has a large variety of templates (FREE AS WELL). I prefer the phpbb template system as it's straightforward and simple to use. Yes, you should subscribe to the phpbb newsletter in case of an update. It's been a tough year for phpbb but's it's really not bad. I run patch on each of my forums (over 8 of them) and in about 30 minutes it's all done. With any site you should backup frequently. If you think your safe cuz your are on VB you're just stupid. VB does not have 1 single thing in it's software that you can say is better than PHPBB. If VB has the hack then so does PHPBB except the phpbb version is FREE and without restrictions.
How about the plug-in system so you don't need to modify any files when upgrading (and not loosing your hacks)?
I've just moved a forum from phpBB to vBulletin and the owners are ecstatic. As a user I prefer vBulletin because I can subscribe to forums of interest and track them with daily emails. Even easier than using my RSS reader. I've signed up to a few phpBB forums in the past few days and it's a drag not knowing what's new in them. I don't imagine I'll be active at them. Perhaps that's no great loss but ... Listen up forum owners!
Minstral? sp likes phpbb but after battling spammers I have nothing good to say about it. Yes I can patch until the cows come home but I did not want the hassles of keeping it clean. Shannon
vBulletin hands down. you can spend $150 and be done with your mods and upgrades in an evening, or mess around with phpbb piecemeal everytime a new threat emerges. If you would rather not spend the money initally, maybe try phpbb and then migrate if the forum takes off.
1. You can easily upgrade phpbb with the patch files...take about 30 seconds. I have 30-40 mods installed and still the patch does all my changes for me no problem. 2. You can install a mod for better management of watched topics (easy to install). VB might be more powerful than PHPBB...I will give ya that....but then again..the #1 forums on the web is PHPBB. You can go a long way with phpbb. If VB was cheaper I might think differently but really most people starting a site are just wasting their money on a VB license. How often do you see licenses for sale? How about dead forums that just simply didn't go anywhere? Also VB sites imho are harder to sell since the license is always an issue. With phpbb...you are good to go. Also if you are sure your site is taking off...it's easy to switch. VB will even do it for you fairly cheap. There are lots of users that like phpbb over VB. Of course many like VB over phpbb. Personally I like certain features of VB but overall I prefer phpbb. The security of phpbb can at times be an issue but that's the price you pay for free software. Backups are free and only take a few minutes a week to perform. Cron a backup nightly and you're good to go. Also there are TONS more mods for phpbb than VB. TONS AND TONS...with more coming every week.
Vb is by for the best forum software. Obviously it is quite expensive but with the amount of features you will find out that this should have been 100x as much as you paid.
VB is probably the best, but PHPBB is definitely NOT CRAP! It's an excellent system - free, stable, secure (yes, secure, just apply patches as they release them, not months and month later) and with tons of free mods. Applying multiple mods is a PAIN though, I agree on this
vB is certianly the best IMO... I set up a forum recently, and after being harrassed about it being set up on phpBB, decided to make the switch to vB... Man, you will NEVER go back... And first and foremost in my opinion, it's the members of a forum that matter most - And 90% of those prefer vB in my experience...
Not if you install EasyMod... then applying MODs is a 2 minute snap in most cases. Also makes it fast and easy to apply the phpBB updates.