vBulletin vs. IP.Board - Which is Better?

IPB looks a lot better and much more intuitive to use in my opinion. Ppl used to tell me that just find a good skin for vB, so I got vb. however after a while I got annoyed by it's format and switched to ipb.

Also, after looking through literally hundreds of skins for both. For some reason IPB skins looks cleaner and just OVerall better to me.

 

Wow, the ignorance here. Do either of you even have experience racing? Surely people with no experience aren't trying to disprove the existing logic.

A Ferrari is a completely different car than a Ford Focus. Firstly, you wouldn't be racing your Focus against any higher-end cars; you race it in your own class. So yes, there is definitely a possibility of winning.

Secondly, if you're getting into racing, that means you don't have any of the foundations down. A high-end sports car is extremely hard to drive for anyone for the first time, even with racing experience.

The clutch is nothing like that of an entry-level car. It is much more sensitive, often extremely light, and very hard to engage if you don't know what you're doing. The engine is extremely powerful and it can be very hard to restrain the power, especially on a track when speed management is key.

So on top of worrying about how to even drive your car, you have to worry about the fundamentals of racing. Turns, acceleration, deceleration, driving lines, etc. You won't know anything about any of these. Why would you burden yourself with a car you can't drive in a sport you know nothing about? At least eliminate one of those burdens by buying a lower-end car that you can easily learn in so that you can upgrade later on if you wish. Besides, if you have the money for a Ferrari, you can surely spare some money to buy a Focus to learn in.

Aside from that, the reason you would quit racing are because you just don't like it or you crashed your car. Why would you put up several hundred thousand dollars just to see if you like a sport?

You'll generally get the same experience in a Focus rather than a Ferrari, except your lap time will just be faster in the Ferrari. But you can still gauge if you like the sport in the lower-end car, so putting up all that money is just irresponsible.

The other reason you would get out of the sport is if you crashed your car, which is VERY common for a novice racer, from a small dent to completely totaling the car. So on top of leaving the sport, you have a trashed car that, no, you actually CAN'T sell. So start out on a smaller car you can afford to beat up a bit to learn what you're doing.

Besides that, your logic defies the standard procedure of life. Do you go straight to college right out of the womb? Why go to elementary school to high school when you can just go straight to college? Why ever get an entry-level hourly job when you could just wait several years and try to get a degree-based salary position - with absolutely no job experience?

Life is full of stepping stones. To completely disregard the procedure for learning anything in life is just ignorant.

You can get a powerful, paid board, sure. Do you know how to install it? Do you know how to manage a community? Do you know how to install mods? Do you know what kind of server you will need? Do you know how to operate the backend of a forum?

Because if you don't, why waste your time learning on a powerful board? If you're building a community and don't have forum experience, then you should be on a cheaper or free system that will allow you to develop your skills. If you have a large, paid board system, it should mean that you have a large, dedicated user base - they aren't going to want to wait around for you to learn how to use your board system; they'll want an experienced forum owner.

 

i'm having a problem getting to the 2nd page.

 

Ok...sorry about that.....for some reason my browser would not let me get to the 2nd page yesterday.

ANYWAY...i don't know if anyone has considered the Learning Curve associated with learning these programs.

As with any program...there is a learning curve...and I SURE there is one with learning, posting and USING a Bulletin Board Forum Software Program.

Anyone consider this as well?

 

I'd prefer IPB, but if VB 5 was faster, it would be very much close.

 

Depends on what you need really.

vBulletin 4 is okay if you just want a forum but if you need something bigger then IPB for sure. The add-ons, especially IP.Content, are amazing.

 

I started with vBulletin because everyone was saying it's the industry standard and how it's the best. And if you look at most of the big forums out there for some reason, including this one they run on vBulletin.

However, since I have switched to IPB and I do like it more than vBulletin. It is cleaner and nicer looking no matter how many times I used to be told, it depends on the theme you choose. But I've looked through thousands of themes and for some reason IPB always seems to stand out to me. Secondly, I would say that IPB is more intuitive as well.

Regarding the cost, I don't think IPB is more expensive. Sure they have a 25 dollar renewal fee per 6 months if you want to update the software; but vBulletin are not really lifetime imo like IPB. When they have a update like 3 to 4, version 3 is discontinued and you will need to dish out not $25 bucks but hundreds more to upgrade. So vBulletin is more expensive in the long-run.

 

Anyone know, which is Digitalpoint using? VB or IPB?

 

neither

 

+1 for Vanilla here, great forum software, support and extensibility

 

DP is now using Xenforo. Previously, DP is using VB.

 

I still want answers to ALL of the below questions.
1. Which forum gives you more value for the amount of money put in (short term and long term)?
2. Which has the most amount of features (such as putting people in custom groups, processing payments, etc)?
3. Which has better SEO?
4. Which will be better optimized for mobile (the actual website, not Forum Runner or Tapatalk)?

I have an smf board and a phpbb board which need converted (migrated) between IBP 3.x and VB 4.x
In addition,

5. which has a better, more complete migration process? Will I lose passwords? Anyone have have experience with this?

 

You will find most free products SUCK!! There are obviously exceptions to the "rule" of course... By the way... IP.Board is $175 with a $25 renewal fee. If you keep your forum a live for 2 years it's about $.28 per day. Breaking it down per month that's less than cheap web hosting or a domain with a coupon. You will receive live support, updates, and be able to use an application that was developed and tested professionally. If you think that is a money pit, you shouldn't start a web site. Web sites are both a money and time pit!

 

SMF is my recommendation: http://www.simplemachines.org

 

IPB is much better than vBulletin. IPB has a great skins, mods, apps.