Should I upgrade to vb 4?

Now that some of the dust has settled, I'm wondering if there are any tangible benefits to upgrading to vBulletin 4. I haven't yet bought or used vBseo and it was for just this reason. I didn't want to have to worry about moving to another product and then realizing that I could have issues with upgrading. This makes it clean and simple to move and do what I want. I highly doubt vBulletin 5 is coming out any time soon and I don't think I'd care to go in that direction even if it did.

vBulelletin 4 does provide better SEO, which I'm sure will improve over time. Whether or not to buy vBseo for it... I'm not sure yet. The first step is answering the question as to whether it's a good idea. I'm at a pivotal point of development on my web site and need to make a decision whether or not to do it. If I don't do it now, doing it later might be difficult.

Another reason to upgrade is the new hacks and updates to them. While I know a ton of bigboards won't upgrade, much is due to their desire not to make those changes for new versions. My site has a couple of essential hacks but the most important ones have been modified for vBulletin 4. As I have over 100,000 posts on my forum, there are decisions to be made.

I'm curious to know your thoughts and thank you for sharing.

To be honest that is only a question that you can ask yourself. If it were me, it would depend on the site. I would do numerous test upgrades, then i would probably just go for it once I had a style that matched the old one as closely as possible.

Originally Posted by Michael Biddle

To be honest that is only a question that you can ask yourself. If it were me, it would depend on the site. I would do numerous test upgrades, then i would probably just go for it once I had a style that matched the old one as closely as possible.

Thanks for your answer:

1. I have a style that matches (might even be better, actually) than the 3.8.5 one I have right now.

2. I'm going to miss the experience hack but I'll live with it. The other items seem to work just perfectly.

So assuming all things equal, I don't know if I'm better off with the new version. Slower? Will I see a performance hit? I've noticed some new boards, including this place, have upgraded and I'm assuming there are benefits to doing so, including future PHP support and compatibility (although other forums will find solutions, given their sheer size.)

We personally didn't see any performance hit when upgrading to vB4 though it notably has many more feature included in it as standard so it is expected that it will take a little more processor power.

Some the the key benefits will be the CSS style this can be used to really improve the performance and loading speed of your site. Then yes the is the future PHP support and compatibility and at some point development for vB3 mods will stop and you will have to use vB4 to get the feature you want. Obviously none of this makes it essential to use vB4 but it most certainly makes it all worth while.

Regarding SEO you are quite right they are building some SEO features into vBulletin as standard but you can see straight away from vBSEO - Feature Comparison vBSEO for vBulletin how much more SEO wise vBSEO will give you than stock vB4, and while they may add more SEO functionality so will we so I can assure you for a very long time vBSEO will remain your best option in regards to SEO.

All in all in the end though like mike said it is a choice you need to make, if you run vB4 or vB3 should really depend on the type of site and both yours and your users opinion on each version. Run multiple test installs make sure that everything is work as you want it to, have a select number of your customers test out the new board see if you can find any isssue or bugs etc and once all this has been done make the final choice.

Dust has not settled for me
We have always upgraded vB and vBSEO as soon as available. It has not been until vB4 that I have had so many issues, patches, 403 now 404 fix some and create other issues. It is a total time drain for me, but I am not in this to become a technical expert required to make changes to code. My vB 403 and 404 has changed how I spend my time. I love my business model and my paid subscribers thank me for how we use it, so I guess I am happy when I look at options.

My expectation is to load nonbeta and paid for software and have it work when following instructions. CMS does not work for me since 404 and load speed varies on forums tab from good to 10 seconds to does not load. vB support tells me what to do, I understand half of the instructions and as a smart guy figure out what to do, but...I will let you know They blame vBSEO which I don't know if true or not - disabling is inconclusive.

My advice to you depends on time dedicated to code, test sites and purpose for your site. When you commit to vBSEO you are in related to links. If I break that and organically wait for a fix I am still in a bad situation, because my affiliates and partners will have broken links and my ability to find and provide customer service is almost impossible. I wont do that, so, I am stuck with vBSEO. Stuck might not be the right word - Might be a good thing, but hope vB and vBSEO together result in my site production IS what keeps me up at night on this business. Right now, my site performance is the worst it has been and rankings/ad revenue has not recovered from dip after Dec. 2009 upgrades.

I hope this helps?

Originally Posted by refundrequest

Now that some of the dust has settled, I'm wondering if there are any tangible benefits to upgrading to vBulletin 4. I haven't yet bought or used vBseo and it was for just this reason. I didn't want to have to worry about moving to another product and then realizing that I could have issues with upgrading. This makes it clean and simple to move and do what I want. I highly doubt vBulletin 5 is coming out any time soon and I don't think I'd care to go in that direction even if it did.

vBulelletin 4 does provide better SEO, which I'm sure will improve over time. Whether or not to buy vBseo for it... I'm not sure yet. The first step is answering the question as to whether it's a good idea. I'm at a pivotal point of development on my web site and need to make a decision whether or not to do it. If I don't do it now, doing it later might be difficult.

Another reason to upgrade is the new hacks and updates to them. While I know a ton of bigboards won't upgrade, much is due to their desire not to make those changes for new versions. My site has a couple of essential hacks but the most important ones have been modified for vBulletin 4. As I have over 100,000 posts on my forum, there are decisions to be made.

I'm curious to know your thoughts and thank you for sharing.

honestly? no ... the latest release (4.0.4) is too much buggy ... i would advise you ... wait the next release, maybe is better ...

4.0.4 was rushed, i will agree. While it fixed 500+ bugs, it created XX more that didn't exist until .4.

I haven't upgraded my big site yet. Not sure when i will do it. no plans as of yet.

Originally Posted by Brian Cummiskey

4.0.4 was rushed, i will agree. While it fixed 500+ bugs, it created XX more that didn't exist until .4.

I haven't upgraded my big site yet. Not sure when i will do it. no plans as of yet.

Brian... as usual, your advice is indispensible. My board is far too important than to trust to this kind of nonsense. Digitalpoint can do what it wants but you're far from the first I've heard say this. The big challenge I have is that I need to make some decisions now. Thanks for helping me with your insight of running your big site and others.

Here is a vbseo question:

What happens going forward a year from now. I may never choose to go to vB 4. However, I may choose to use vBseo on some of these boards. Right now though, I am having a difficult time making a decision on them. I don't want to use vbseo on them if there is a chance I'l move to vB 4 imminently. I think if you go vbseo, you want to do that transition after, not before. Makes everything easier and I've heard of people having problems with the crossover and IB is blaming vbseo. Hard to say who is at fault and why not avoid it entirely if you can.

Now with regard to vB 3, will vBseo ever release the unencoded version when it's unsupported? My concern is that I invest a ton in vB 3.x and in a year or so vBSEO decides, understandably, that vBseo for vB 3.x will be a discontinued product and I might be left with a board I can't keep updated as LAMP changes. An understandable concern. Perhaps someone can speak on this topic.

My biggest issue is this: What does vb4 give me that I don't have with 3.x? I have no need for a cms, as i already have 'aritcle' forums. Other than that, vb4 offers my users nothing 'worthwhile' to their experience on my site.
Plus, there's the 50+ custom things like ads and what not that i will have to migrate..... and the hours upon hours of re indexing the search table nightmare. And then, the skin. And then, theres talks of 4.1 re-doing the entire skin system making what i've done in < 4.1 useless.
So, at the very least, i'm waiting until 4.1.

vb3.8.x will meet end of life eventually, probably next year. And thus, it won't be secure to keep long term after that most likely.


Still, the built in SEO of vb4 is currently lame at best. If you truly care about your SEO, vbseo is still the way to go, even on vb4. That may change in the future. Who knows how far IB will go with it.

vBSEO hasn't been encoded in nearly 3.5 years it is open code.
our latest version, 3.5.1 supports BOTH vb3 and vb4 series boards, and for the immediate future, this will be the plan for all new releases as well. So long as we can stay in business, we will stay in business. The future is unknown to everyone at this point. As long as we can keep license sales high enough to pay for the staff/etc, we aren't going anywhere.

Originally Posted by Brian Cummiskey

My biggest issue is this: What does vb4 give me that I don't have with 3.x? I have no need for a cms, as i already have 'aritcle' forums. Other than that, vb4 offers my users nothing 'worthwhile' to their experience on my site. Plus, there's the 50+ custom things like ads and what not that i will have to migrate..... and the hours upon hours of re indexing the search table nightmare. And then, the skin. And then, theres talks of 4.1 re-doing the entire skin system making what i've done in < 4.1 useless. So, at the very least, i'm waiting until 4.1.

I hear you. My problem is that I am doing a major site upgrade and didn't want to invest in the integration of 3.x if I was going to do this again in 6 months with 4.1, assuming it ever gets there. The other option has been Invision Board, which is much sleeker although there are some question marks, including whether losing all my URLs and then having them re-indexed after almost 10 years is what I want...

vb3.8.x will meet end of life eventually, probably next year. And thus, it won't be secure to keep long term after that most likely. Still, the built in SEO of vb4 is currently lame at best. If you truly care about your SEO, vbseo is still the way to go, even on vb4. That may change in the future. Who knows how far IB will go with it.

Very true about the end of life, including advancing PHP and MYSQL requirements. The built inSEO of vB4 is lame, no question, although it's better than it used to. When they get around to that is anyone's guess. Given the need for a few things, I was considering vBseo but cost and potential sites, indecision on which forum to use, is keeping me still thinking at this point (was wondering if July 4 brought any discounts, lol.)

vBSEO hasn't been encoded in nearly 3.5 years it is open code.
our latest version, 3.5.1 supports BOTH vb3 and vb4 series boards, and for the immediate future, this will be the plan for all new releases as well. So long as we can stay in business, we will stay in business. The future is unknown to everyone at this point. As long as we can keep license sales high enough to pay for the staff/etc, we aren't going anywhere.

Well this is good to know.