Newbie [few questions]

[doobster]

Guys
Hi i am a currently community forum owner at present on Ucoz systems but seriously considering a change to V-bulletin software for our management but am finding it hard to gain straight answers to simple questions due primarily to rules & Regs on other v-bulletin groups and am hoping you guys can help...

A quick Bio then i own run manage and operate a few communities the largest of which has currently 2000+ members and growing daily in the motoring field i do everything really backend myslef and am a fully non profit non cost community i am considering a change due to time contraints and ongoing projects taking to much of my time where Ucoz as a free offering suited us at the time it is now failing badly on several levels sadly, so here goes if i tell you what i want/need out of the sotware maybe you guys can tell me if its possible and at what level i would be required to be at to keep it all going i would class myself as Intermidiary at present able to work in css [Ucoz is a mix of Css and Html for those who dont know with a liberal does of wysiwyg for good measure]

So what i am looking for is firstly an affordable solution in terms of outlay and time involverd in managing a community able and capable of expanding along with us, to be able to provide cutting edge design and adaptability, where i can do simple tasks from one control panel with Ucoz i cant do these following tasks that i hope V-Bulletin will allow me to 1 - send a newsletter to ALL members from oen palce [where as now i am forced to send seperately to all memebrs 2000+ is a tiresome job] 2 - i need to be able to when a new member is joining have teh ability for teh registration to go like this 1 - fiill in ALL details correctly 2 - accept/varify registration [not going to junk/spam mail] 3 - be then directed back to Introdcustions forum 4- after a full and frank intro has been carried out they get access to x no of forums depending on posts they move up step my step until they can access ALL sections but not until then [where as now they join and have full access to all] 5 - be able to get a full customise a background easily/cheaply produced if not a company or individual to be able to set it all up for me !!! handing it back fully done ...

So if anyone wishes to advise lead or show me how to and what to do i would be eternally gratefull

[BirdOPrey5]

Giving users access to more forums based on post count is easily setup using the built in "Promotions" system and making new usergroups, each with different levels of access.

For the newsletter there is a very powerful newsletter modification called microNEWSLETTER available here you can download after you buy a license.

As for your registration steps you can add code to verify custom fields appear to be valid by matching them against a regular expression- this is a little bit advanced but part of the standard vbulletin features.

As for forwarding them to an instructions forum that isn't a default option but could be custom coded.