Honest opinion needed: IPB vs XenForo.

A

arcaneex

Active member
In terms of functionallity and addons, user support too. What's better?
As far as I noticed xenforo involves a lot of work if you want to make your own addon , heck it was hard for me to even make a variable that I defined myself available in a template. Now maybe I'm just stupid or something, but I still want to know.
Any help appreciated.
 
arcaneex said:
In terms of functionallity and addons, user support too. What's better?
As far as I noticed xenforo involves a lot of work if you want to make your own addon , heck it was hard for me to even make a variable that I defined myself available in a template. Now maybe I'm just stupid or something, but I still want to know.
Any help appreciated.
Click to expand...
XenForo hands down, without question or reserve.

Friendlier
Faster
Securer
Uses fewer resources (IPB uses more resources than even vBulletin 4)
Easier to customize
Better SEO rating (IPB ranks lower than than even phpBB, vBulletin 4 or 5)
 
In terms of addons and user support , who is better? To me it seems IPB , as it is older and has a bigger community. Afaik ( as far as I know ) xenforo.com is the only palce to get resources. While at IPB it's everywhere.
 
That's good that only resources are available here.

One place to download, one place to support. A single point of reference for any add-on.

It also helps prevent piracy of add-ons and hinders those who unfortunately like to use pirated version of the software. If the only place they can download add-ons is here by being a licensed customer then that sounds like a good thing.
 
arcaneex said:
In terms of addons and user support , who is better? To me it seems IPB , as it is older and has a bigger community. Afaik ( as far as I know ) xenforo.com is the only palce to get resources. While at IPB it's everywhere.
Click to expand...
IPB resources are mostly paid adding to your cost, but most importantly add to the current resource load to an already heavy resource product.

XenForo resources are mostly free and continue to grow daily, but more importantly do not add to the load. I have over 300 add-ons on my site and it loads just as fast as XenForo.com with over 200 people online.
 
Chris Deeming said:
That's good that only resources are available here.

One place to download, one place to support. A single point of reference for any add-on.

It also helps prevent piracy of add-ons and hinders those who unfortunately like to use pirated version of the software. If the only place they can download add-ons is here by being a licensed customer then that sounds like a good thing.
Click to expand...
Agreed.. Think XenFans and all the great resources that went bye bye when they closed shop.
 
If someone were to ever throw me a free IPB license I'd gladly compare the two, but as that's not too likely to happen, I'd rather stay here. XF has really impressed me.
 
I posted this elsewhere, might as well here:

whichloadsfaster.webp
 
I personally think the comparison is very important, as IPS is the only other commercial board software with a legitimate future. While I'm still working through the old XF vs. IPB thread, I did find this very interesting topic: currently open IPB bugs, as of 3.3.4:

http://community.invisionpower.com/resources/bugs.html/_/ip-board/?sort_col=record_updated&sort_order=desc&per_page=25&filters[64][Confirmed - General]=1&filters[64][Confirmed - Skin Issue]=1&filters[64][Confirmed - Minimal Impact]=1&filters[64][Will Fix - IP.Suite 4.0]=1&filters[64][Confirmed - FAO Matt]=1

25 bugs per page, over 7 pages.

There are currently no bugs in XF that I'm aware of, aside from 4-5 minimal-impact issues (not even bugs), that a few people have reported.
 
Andrej said:
You should seek advice on a more neutral forum because there will be mostly biased replies towards Xenforo, because its the XenForo's company forums.
Click to expand...
Mostly any forum you go to, there will be bias replies (as script license owners will be lurking mostly everywhere / worst if one forum is flooded with X forum script users).

The best bet is to try out both demos for yourself and see which one you prefer for your forum.
Look at add-ons that works for your forum and compare:
arcaneex said:
In terms of functionallity and addons, user support too. What's better?
Click to expand...
Forum support is still going great. I'm not sure about the ticket system since the delay in 1.2 development.
arcaneex said:
As far as I noticed xenforo involves a lot of work if you want to make your own addon
Click to expand...
It depends on your knowledge of programming.
Making a simple add-on is a piece of cake and there are useful tutorials to help you along the way [archived].
If you're stuck, you can always ask a question - http://xenforo.com/community/forums/xenforo-development-discussions.34/
 
No offense but IPS looks prettier. Reminds me of my 99 Mercury Cougar. Pretty, but slow. I drive a 04 350Z Touring now. May not be as pretty but it's faster and chicks still dig it.
 
arcaneex said:
In terms of functionallity and addons, user support too. What's better?
As far as I noticed xenforo involves a lot of work if you want to make your own addon , heck it was hard for me to even make a variable that I defined myself available in a template. Now maybe I'm just stupid or something, but I still want to know.
Any help appreciated.
Click to expand...
For features: IPB
For speed and UI: XF
 
R_A said:
I posted this elsewhere, might as well here:

View attachment 34309
Click to expand...
Doesn't this depend on hosting, amount of posts and all the database info, users, pictures, and so on? I mean , the more users, pics , uploads , topics the more bandwidth it takes. I might be wrong , though.
I'm really looking only for the functionality rather than UI and candy eye stuff , after all it can be just redesigned.
 
arcaneex said:
Doesn't this depend on hosting, amount of posts and all the database info, users, pictures, and so on?
Click to expand...
On hosting I wasn't going to say anything, but XF just started, and there's probably no money for world-class hosting, so the results are likely to be even more lop-sided if XF were hosted on IPB's servers.

The amount of posts doesn't determine how forumdisplay is rendered (at least it shouldn't). You only display the latest post, in its particular forum.

And as per pictures from user-profiles, you can visually see that IPB chooses to render them, while XF does not. This undoubtedly adds to the speed drain. Ultimately you have to ask, how important is it to render profile images on the home page? Is it a good design? Does it add to the user experience?

On a purely personal level I find it very clunky and distracting, so a solution which removes them and gets faster as a result is preferable. It baffles my mind that VB5 went in the IPB as opposed to XF direction on this; looks like they really want a mini-version of Facebook, where it's ultra-important who made the last post, how they look like, what their picture says about them, etc. On old-time forums, that would be a very misguided thing for a user to look at.
 
arcaneex said:
In terms of functionallity and addons, user support too. What's better?
As far as I noticed xenforo involves a lot of work if you want to make your own addon , heck it was hard for me to even make a variable that I defined myself available in a template. Now maybe I'm just stupid or something, but I still want to know.
Any help appreciated.
Click to expand...

Christ dude you can't ask that kinda question here. You'll be labled an IPB stooge and laughed outta the place in no time...

But anyway, what kind of functionality are you looking for? XenForo offers a unique set of features as well as IPB. IPB probably offers more functionality than XenForo currently, and has more addons ( XenForo has 0 official addons where as IPB has 5 or 6).

User support is probably a draw, you'll get good and awful advice from members of either forum.

It's really what suites your needs better, if you're having a hardtime on Xenforo and think IPB will be a better fit then go that route. They offer a test site to play with. If IPB isn't your cup of tea and you like XenForo then stick around :D

Snap 2012-09-17 at 13.20.53.webp
 

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