Having used everything from MyBB, to PHPBB, IPB, Xen and vBulletin I've had the opportunity to browse Control panels, Forum Layouts and Active Moderation, I've narrowed it down to two choices. MyBB, being a free alternative, is something I would actually pay money for. It's an open source script and everything can be modified, customized and changed. You can quite literally get rid of any connection to MyBB and make it look like something completely new. The only thing that I haven't been able to change to my satisfactory is the User Info Bread crumb or the "Userinfopane" as much of the IPB users know it as. The bold italic lettering and thick imaging is the one thing that turned me off MyBB. And than of course there's IP. Board with it's awesome and easy to use Moderation and Administration Panels, it's stable, reliable and wide arrange of Modifications and Add-ons and of course, the premium spam protection from a Valid IPB License (Man I miss my License) The only thing that bothers me about IP. Board is it can be very hard to fully customize unless you know what you're doing. Much of the time, IP. Board always looks an IP. Board simply due to the way it's laid out. There are exceptions to this of course (Take for example Tom Christians X-Gaming skin) From a first glance, you never would have guess that it was IP. Board. Other than that, I love everything about it.