Help a Dummy create a discussion board

[Megamorph]

My wife is a chef and she has decided that she would like to start her own "cooking" discussion board. We are both dummies when it comes to this stuff, but I know it can't be too difficult to get setup and maintain.

I was thinking about using vBulletin. Does anyone have any experience with this? Is there something better?

Also, what should I expect to spend for hosting?

 

[Colt45]

use a free one, like PHPBB.

for hosting you'll need PHP + SQL.

really really simple to set up though..

 

[chiwawa626]

Realisticly speaking traffic will prolly be low, until it gets going i suggest you use a free host with a freeboard like http://www.ezboard.com/

 

[jcovercash]

You can get a domain through godaddy.com for like 9 bucks, then get hosting through ripplehost for 4.99 for a YEAR.

Its not the fastest hosting service but for the money its great.
My site www.mamebox.net {Not finished with it yet }i s hosted on their servers, I have forums with it too www.mamebox.net/forum/ {Also incomplete}

If you go with ripplehost their automatic phpbb install doesnt seem to work 100% all the tim so you may want to do a manual install which is what I did.


Just an option.

Josh

 

[Megamorph]

My wife and I both make good money, so we aren't really in a position where we need to cut corners. I don't mind spending the money to do it right. I know "good" and "cheap" don't typically go hand-in-hand when talking about hosting.

 

[jcovercash]

Well I havent had any problems with my hosting so far. another good yet cheap host is addaction.net rossman uses it and is really happy with their service, Im fixing to switch over to it in a week or so too.

Josh

 

[wicktron]

Addaction owns.

 

[ChrisIsBored]

Go with DixieSys for hosting then... $9.99/month and they're guaranteeing 99.9% uptime now I believe.

For your bulletin board, phpBB is the best since it's not only free, but if you spend some time playing with it, there are TONS of modifications you can add. Invision has a nicer look imo but I haven't tried it so I can't really compare the two.

 

[Megamorph]

no one has experience with vBulletin? I always thought those boards looked good, but I don't know anything about Invision either.

 

[wicktron]

Originally posted by: Megamorph
no one has experience with vBulletin? I always thought those boards looked good, but I don't know anything about Invision either.

vBulletin is great but not free.
Invision is wonderful, in fact, my choice for best free bulletin board choice.

 

[Megamorph]

Originally posted by: wixt0r

Originally posted by: Megamorph
no one has experience with vBulletin? I always thought those boards looked good, but I don't know anything about Invision either.

vBulletin is great but not free.
Invision is wonderful, in fact, my choice for best free bulletin board choice.

Is Invision supposed to be a better product than vBulletin? They are promoting it as an upgrade from vBulletin.

 

[SunnyD]

phpBB is really, REALLY nice. It's on par with the professional boards imho. The only drawback is I don't think it scales quite as well if you're talking something as popular as say Anandtech.

Other than that, I had Apache 2.0 + phpBB + MySQL + WinXP Pro running in a day. I don't think it gets much better than that.

 

[RossMAN]

vBulletin which is not free is the best forum software. You can see it in action at several hundred different forums including DVDTalk, WebHostingTalk and HTTPme.COM.

I would not recommend using vBulletin right off the bat unless you KNOW for certain that you're going to have over 5,000 members with at least 50 active members during any given moment. If you realistically know you're going to get this kind of traffic (or have really good advertising) then get vBulletin.

Instead I would recommend starting with InvisionBoard forum software which is free, efficient, powerful and has a nice clean look to it. My forums uses InvisionBoard forum software and so far I LOVE IT!

So if you want the absolute best and don't mind paying for it then get vBulletin but again I think it's overkill.

The BEST free forum software is InvisionBoard, although it's free it's still quite powerful and customizable. The best part is how EASY it is to install and maintain, I am a total forum newbie and I've learned everything just by reading the manuals, asking people and playing around.

For hosting you could spend $5/yr to $20/mo, what is your budget for hosting? This is where you do not want to go cheap.

 

[pyonir]

If RossMAN can do it....ANYONE can.

Good luck with it.

 

[RossMAN]

I also installed phpBB as well which is EVEN easier but I don't like it as much and will be deleting my phpBB forum in a few days.

http://nef.gottadeal.com/

 

[Tetsuo]

why pay for vbulletin when you can get invision board? everything is free, all the hacks you can dream of and its easy as pie to set up

i worked with VBB (vbulletin) on my own site for almost 2 years, but got sick of it, i then switced to invision board and i now cant stand VBB. dont ever go and use a UBB board as they are cgi based and are easy to hack (ie delete your members, take away your admin rights etc etc)

if you need help or are interested in webhosting drop me a line on my email

 

[RossMAN]

tetuyeda - I totally agree!

Why did you get sick of vBulletin?

 

[Tetsuo]

Originally posted by: RossMAN
tetuyeda - I totally agree! Why did you get sick of vBulletin?

i just got sick of the admin cp, too many menus. in some ways i miss the VBB cp but i love the INVB cp way too much now to go back. plus i just loving playing with new programs and learning them, so thats another reason i switched

 

[wicktron]

Hey Rossman, what portal hack are you using for your Invision front page there?

 

[chiwawa626]

Just get a host that uses CPANEL and that way it can automaticly setup a number of forums for you

 

[RossMAN]

wixt0r - I believe I'm using the default IB skin, here's a great place to get some InvisionBoard Skins.

chiwawa626 - Yep that's what I did, my webhost provider has a customized cPanel with auto installers you can auto install any of the following with a few clicks, that's it. Best of all I'm only paying $9.95 for the first 6 months you can't beat that!

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[Megamorph]

Wow. Thanks for the info guys. Its been a great help. Keep it coming.

Does anyone know of any cool Invision forums that I can check out?

$20/mo for hosting seems cheap. I hear people complaining all the time about costs of $500-1000/mo. What am I missing?

 

[RossMAN]

$500-$1000/mo?

LOL

Maybe if your website gets advertised on the cooking channel a lot and you have millions of visitors then you'll need to get a dedicated server from Rackspace.com or ThePlanet.com.

 

[RossMAN]

Originally posted by: Megamorph
Does anyone know of any cool Invision forums that I can check out?

http://forums.invisionpower.com/

http://forums.gottadeal.com/

Do you have AIM or MSN or ICQ?

 

[Placer14]

Hey Mega, RossMAN is pretty on top of things...he's a newb that got it running from start. If you need any help with board mods or hosting setup, I'm here to help too.