It's a bit busy for my liking

Please explain further.

I agree that for a small forum, you have too many categories. Visually, the aqua color is OK (being that it is a Mac forum), but the overall look is very generic. As a point of comparison, look at this forum:

http://www.aqua-soft.org/board/

You can even buy that style from them if you're interested: http://www.aqua-soft.org/board/showthread.php?t=49571

I have no relationship with that site; I'm not even a member... I just did a Google search and stumbled upon it. There are a number of other Mac-like vB styles out there which I've seen as well.

Personally, I think "shout boxes" are rather juvenile and they also may decrease forum traffic because people hang out in the shout box rather than posting messages in the forums themselves. Of course, ultimately it is your choice as to the "ambiance" of your forum.

- Dan