Just downgraded to vBulletin 3

[MaXimus]

I had the latest vBulletin 4.11.1 Patch Level 1 before but upon viewing some of the most visited forums in the world like Crackberry, Wilder Security, Anandtech, and even this site I noticed they are all using vbullerin v3 and I liked the interface much more than v4. It is very simple and effecient, and the smilies look more professional rather than cartoony although that is not my reason to switch obviously since you can change those manually but just saying...

A few questions:

1) Any idea why these large forums still stick to v3 rather than upgrade to v4?

2) Am I missing on any security features by downgrading to v3? I did install the latest 3.8.7 .... does vBulletin continuously release updates for the older v3 ?

3) Am I the only one who sees v3 better than v4 in terms of UI and speed?

[New Joe]

1) Maybe they are too heavily modded up with modifications which work just how they want them and don't want to go through the pain of up dating them or finding out they can't get what they need.

2) I think the latest 3.8.x is as secure as anything else

3) i thought the same say 2 years back, but now I love the look of vb4 and find vb3 and outdated look., however I found the vb3 much faster to load and get around.

[MaXimus]

Originally Posted by New Joe

1) Maybe they are too heavily modded up with modifications which work just how they want them and don't want to go through the pain of up dating them or finding out they can't get what they need.

2) I think the latest 3.8.x is as secure as anything else

3) i thought the same say 2 years back, but now I love the look of vb4 and find vb3 and outdated look., however I found the vb3 much faster to load and get around.

thank you for your detailed answers.

And yes I am liking the increased speed pages load snappier and a few things like...when you highlight some text then click on the URL button to add a link....that used to take like a second or two with vB4 but not it happens instantly!

I also like how you can select the font color size, font type and smilies from a drop down list, much more compact and usable design...

just my 2 cents

Just click on the link in my sig and browse around a little bit and youll see the speed

I am slowly restoring the threads as the database conversion from v4 to v3 didn't work out so I ended up creating a whole new database.

didn't have any members anyway since my forums are new

[goxy63]

I do love vb4 but its just pain in a but, CMS is far from functional and good option which we have with vb4, its not displayed in all browsers in same way, way too many bugs and looks like vb development team is thinking just about $....

Just don't like it more as I did when I bought my licence with vb3, probably I will never leave VB but before I was never thinking about alternative to VB, now I do think about that

Using VB4 now, would never downgrade from vb4 to vb3, rather would think of some free software than that...

[MaXimus]

Originally Posted by goxy63

Using VB4 now, would never downgrade from vb4 to vb3, rather would think of some free software than that...

Ohh trust me.. I've tried that first...had nightmares with phpBB3....maybe other alternatives are better I don't know...

Read this bro: Why I ditched phpBB3 and upgraded to vBulletin!

[Adam H]

I wouldnt downgrade from 4 to 3 , If i wanted the look and feel of VB3 i would have just made a theme to look exactly like VB3. Your a braver man than me.

UI can be replicated , Speed will increase with a more light weight theme which doesnt have all the CSS3 styling attached, Not only that but VB4 can be made fast enough so you wouldnt notice the difference .

VB4 offers better functionality, better on page SEO and all the bloat can be removed.

[MaXimus]

Originally Posted by Adam H

I wouldnt downgrade from 4 to 3 , If i wanted the look and feel of VB3 i would have just made a theme to look exactly like VB3. Your a braver man than me.

UI can be replicated , Speed will increase with a more light weight theme which doesnt have all the CSS3 styling attached, Not only that but VB4 can be made fast enough so you wouldnt notice the difference .

VB4 offers better functionality, better on page SEO and all the bloat can be removed.

So why is this site, notebook review forums, wilder security forums, crackberry forums, and many others, which have thousands of users still use v3? Just because they dont want to go through the headaches of finding alternatives to their plugins/mods?

I feel it is a bit more than that

[Adam H]

Originally Posted by berryracer

So why is this site, notebook review forums, wilder security forums, crackberry forums, and many others, which have thousands of users still use v3? Just because they dont want to go through the headaches of finding alternatives to their plugins/mods?

I feel it is a bit more than that

Large sites generally dont upgrade unless they need too, why does everyone feel that because there is a new version every site has to upgrade. Large forum owners or in many cases large company forums do have so many custom modification it wouldnt be cost effective to upgrade , expense wise or time wise.

They also have the resources to maintain, develop and secure highly customised board so they rarely have any need for external support or support from such people as vbulletin them selves.

There isnt a massive conspiracy as to why some forums dont upgrade, VB4 is a better system.

It will be a case with many people though, why fix something that isnt broken.

I wasnt aware that your board was brand new when you said you downgraded however which is why i thought it was suicide waiting to happen, but still starting a new board i would want to remain in the loop for as long as possible rather than jumping back on a script which doesnt have the support it once did.

[MaXimus]

Originally Posted by Adam H

I wasnt aware that your board was brand new when you said you downgraded however which is why i thought it was suicide waiting to happen, but still starting a new board i would want to remain in the loop for as long as possible rather than jumping back on a script which doesnt have the support it once did.

Well I wasn't very happy when I contacted support via the ticket system to help me with converting my database using IMPEX from vB4 to vb3 because no matter what I did in the config file of IMPEX it couldn't connect to my vb4 database. I triple checked the settings and Im sure it was something simple to fix but they wouldn't help me telling me I have exceeded the 30 day limit of free tech support

Very disappointing from a company that charged me an arm and a leg for a forums license

[Brandon Sheley]

The "why hasn't this site updated" needs to be asked to those forum owners.
There are 1000's of reasons why large sites wouldn't upgrade, and many have nothing to do with the framework.