Well our site was shut down for the 3rd time by our host because of "resource usage." Yes, we're transferring to a VPS, but still would like to make sure that we choose a forum system which is not as intensive on CPU's resources.

It's not something I'm well-versed in, but I know some of you run your own servers, and have monitored the performance of various forum scripts. (Help me? Please?)

Which of the following forums have the least resource usage?

1. VBulletin
2. SMF

(I did not include pnubb in the list, simply because one of our stakeholders is not particularly fond of it.)

Thanks!

I've been using most of these forums for years, including PhpBB and IPB, and today I've just got my first vB owned license, I just have found that's what I want. I've been with vB as just an end user (visitor, forum member, whatever...) for years, and have read many articles of it, but I still can't say how vB would eat up your system's resource, because it depends, as far as I know after a good configuration to your server and vB itself, it wouldn't be resource intensive, you can also do something with VPS, try to visit vB's official forum and you will find a lot of useful resource.

I don't like SMF btw, however you get what you pay for, vB is professional, and for larger solutions, surely may be somehow more resource intensive comparing to SMF, but I don't have problem with this, because I now will use it for my personal website, the reason is just: I love this software, no any others can compare with it in my mind..

Thanks for your reply. I actually share your sentiments about vBulletin. One sysad advised me against it though when I mentioned my requirements. He said that vBulletin uses more resources than SMF. Hope to get more feedbacks though, just to be sure.

SMF is generally less resource intensive. Perhaps not as "polished" though, and fewer bells and whistles. Another capable low resource forun software is punBB.