If I opt for the paid installation, do I use different host servers?

[bennylava]

Hi all. Newb here. I am considering doing the $50 paid installation. But how exactly would that work, if my host is Hostgator? Does the Xenforo company offer their own host servers that you sign up for? Thank you

 

[Nicolas FR]

The $50 paid installation is performed on your on server, usually that of your hosting company.
XenForo also offers an all-inclusive cloud service.

 

[Paul B]

If you are going to be self-hosted and you want us to install it for you then you need to purchase the license and installation service and as above, we install it on the hosting you have purchased separately.

If you opt for the Cloud service, you just need to subscribe and the site will be ready within 15 minutes.

More information here on Cloud: https://xenforo.com/community/threads/xenforo-cloud-faq.212100/

 

[bennylava]

If you are going to be self-hosted and you want us to install it for you then you need to purchase the license and installation service and as above, we install it on the hosting you have purchased separately.

If you opt for the Cloud service, you just need to subscribe and the site will be ready within 15 minutes.

More information here on Cloud: https://xenforo.com/community/threads/xenforo-cloud-faq.212100/

Sorry about the newb question, but I just want to clarify what that link seems to confirm. Which is that Xenforo Cloud Service does indeed host the Xenforo forums for you. Is that correct?

This would be the first time I've ever done it this way, where it was all the same company. On my wordpress blog, everything was separate and I had to use HostGator to host the blog. Thank you

 

[bennylava]

Another question:

Is 50Gb typically enough? I imagine that members will want to post pics, as well as other things that will use storage. So I would like to ask - At what point does 50Gb become too small? My forum will be for a town with a population of about 40,000 people. It will have various subforums related to the town.

Next question:

In your experience, what is the best way to attract people to your forum? How should I go about getting the word out? I have an idea to hire a direct marketing company, which will put envelope advertisements in mailboxes around the town. As well as using those door hangers. Direct marketing has been shown to be much more effective than signage. Do yall have any suggestions on marketing and attracting people to a message board?

Thank you

 

[Paul B]

Sorry about the newb question, but I just want to clarify what that link seems to confirm. Which is that Xenforo Cloud Service does indeed host the Xenforo forums for you. Is that correct?

Correct.

At what point does 50Gb become too small?

There's no definitive answer.
It depends on activity, attachments being uploaded, etc.

 

[MySiteGuy]

50GB is a huge number of pictures, especially if you set a reasonable upload size limit. Even if you don't use an image compression addon, and figure 1MB per image because of it, you're looking at 50,000 pictures!

 

[bennylava]

Thanks everyone for the help so far! I had to go with my own host because I want the host server to be in my town for the sake of speed. Is there an installation guide for Xenforo once I purchase it? An install video would be very helpful.

 

[Paul B]

I want the host server to be in my town for the sake of speed

These days it's largely irrelevant where the server is located.
Visitors are unlikely to notice a few milliseconds difference.

Installation is very straightforward and detailed in the manual.
There is also an installation support forum you can post in once you have purchased a license.

 

[bennylava]

I'm also considering $50 paid installation so I don't risk getting anything wrong. How does that work when I have a separate host? Do I just hand over my login info, (for the host) and then the Xenforo people install it?

 

[Paul B]

Yes, there is a form to complete which explains the data you need to provide.

 

[bennylava]

Yes, there is a form to complete which explains the data you need to provide.

To clarify, that means I need to purchase the $160 "self hosted" license, correct?

Just wanted to ask because I won't be hosting it myself, on my own home server.

 

[Paul B]

For self hosted licenses you need to purchase the license from us and hosting from elsewhere.

 

[bennylava]

Can I add things to my license at any time? Say I don't purchase the Media Gallery now. Can I upgrade in a few months?

 

[Paul B]

Yes.

 

[TPerry]

Can I add things to my license at any time? Say I don't purchase the Media Gallery now. Can I upgrade in a few months?

yes.... and be aware, they are NOT pro-rated... so if at month 10 into your main license you buy the media gallery, the renewal is linked to your forum renewal so in 2 months you would be paying the renewal of both.
The best suggestion to get the "most value for your money" is to purchase the 3rd party add-ons as early in your license period as possible.

 

[rogerl]

Thanks everyone for the help so far! I had to go with my own host because I want the host server to be in my town for the sake of speed. Is there an installation guide for Xenforo once I purchase it? An install video would be very helpful.

Your users will get far more benefit from a good installation on a good server than they will from a local server. I am not saying there is no benefit in hosting as locally as possible, but if you are on the same continent, users will barely perceive any latency delays.

 

[TPerry]

but if you are on the same continent, users will barely perceive any latency delays.

And then if you add CloudFlare into the mix, even outside the area can get good results.

 

[digitalpoint]

Is 50Gb typically enough? I imagine that members will want to post pics, as well as other things that will use storage. So I would like to ask - At what point does 50Gb become too small? My forum will be for a town with a population of about 40,000 people. It will have various subforums related to the town.

50GB is a ton of space unless you are running something like a photography site. Alternately you can use cloud storage for things like attachments at a pretty cheap cost. Cloudflare R2 give you 10GB for free and then $0.015 per GB per month after that. So if you had 50GB of attachments/avatars to store in the cloud, you would be billed $0.60 per month. 1,000 GB would be $14.85 (either way, it's not bad).

 

[⭐ Alex ⭐]

because I want the host server to be in my town for the sake of speed

I just want to point out that generally high traffic websites will need protection against cyber attacks (DDoS) and that's usually provided for free by a reverse proxy such as Cloudflare which in turn hides the true location of your webserver from the attackers.

Furthermore, Cloudflare is a free content delivery network which means they cache your website assets on the network edge to speed up load times.

So in terms of speed, that's mainly the job of a CDN (content delivery network), not really origin server location.

digitalpoint has a great free addon for connecting XenForo with Cloudflare. https://xenforo.com/community/resources/digitalpoint-app-for-cloudflare®.8750/