Extreme sports forum

[B33R]

www.unitedfreeride.com

This is my brother's extreme sports forum, I just finished setting it up for him. There's still a few minor bugs here and there, but I'm working through them. Until I added a Google webmaster verification metatag, the html was validated.

I'd love to hear what you think of the design, especially the header/logo as I made that, and I don't usually do any graphics.
Any comments/ideas/criticisms you have are all much appreciated.

Thanks
Rob

 

[Fewski]

Looks really nice. Maybe take the top adsense advertisement off until it starts to get more active. The site is very easy to read and loads nice and fast, but for the topic the site is on, maybe change the colors... They're just a little to 'settle' for an extreme sports forum.

Very nice site and I wish your brother luck.

 

[ajkendall]

there's not much to comment on really, it's a simple forum design, however, the header and color scheme are nice but the header image doesn't fill the whole of the screen and i can see a large blue block either side of the image

the color scheme is nice and smooth on the eyes though

 

[B33R]

Thank you both. Rep added.

I'm thinking of adding some extra color in there somewhere, when I get the chance anyway. What little time I do have is currently being spent writing/adding/editing mods.

We're not too worried about how active it is, most of his friends are into extreme sports so when he's told them all, it'll get a lot busier.

Thanks again!

 

[chicker]

The header is wonderful, shame you couldn't make the kitesurfer bigger :lol:

Being a extreme sports fantic myself I really do like the cleaness of the site, sure their is not a lot of colour but I think plain and simple make it easy to use with a nice header, witch you have you create an itendity and the site will follow suit.

I may even join the forums and do a bit of posting, specaily about kitesurfing and surfing, as with a bit of activity the forums will soon grow

 

[antman]

Website Design Review
Site: Extreme Sports Forum
Domain: http://www.unitedfreeride.com/

All Ratings are out of 10...

Website Domain - 7
Appearance and Design - 7
Navigation and Accessibility - 7
Activity, Popularity and Marketing - 5
Originality - 6
Loading Times - 7
Quality of Content - 6
Features and Interactivity - 6
Visitor Rating - 6

Overall Rating - 7

Detailed Analysis

For a first-time graphic, that is really awesome. It goes well, and the colour scheme suits. I don't like that extra space on either side, so could you resize it or add something to fill it up? Adding UnitedFreeride.com into the banner might also be a good suggestion, and possibly a slogan?

The categorization of the forums are something you might want to deal with for the long term. Maybe a 'On land', 'On water', 'On snow' would be a good idea, then have the corresponding forums underneath. It keeps the forum listings not so cluttered. Also, having a detailed description for each forum would let members post more regarding the respective forums.

The Adsense is in a good location, and matches well. I would keep it that way for now. I'm impressed with the number of mods installed. I really like the photo album. As I use to run a forum, a tip I would give is to keep away from too many. They start to slow down the forum when the forum gets active.

For this sort of forum, having dedicated members around the world is essential. Suggested trails, good beaches to surf etc. are quality posts which will get you your members. Advertise it on similar forums, and get quality articles and unique images.

Good luck!

Review by Anthony Lieu. Your site was accessed on an ADSL T1 connection, on Mozilla Firefox with a screen resolution of 1280x1024. Thank you for allowing me to review your website design - I hope it was useful.

 

[B33R]

Wow, thanks antman and chicker!

I'm currently working on adding a second style, exactly the same as the first one but more suited to 800x600, which should free the first style up for 1024x768 and greater, meaning I can fix up the header.

Re: the number of mods, I'm already trying to keep the numbers as low as possible because I plan to upgrade either to phpbb 3.0 or vB soon. Apart from the photo album and the articles manager, there's really not that many mods.
There's a few minor modifications that I've made, like the Youtube embed bbcode - I'm sure that'll come in useful, and a few other ideas I "borrowed", like the Private Messages to Staff forum but nothing too intensive.

Anyway, I better get back to it...

Thanks again for your reviews, they've come in very handy! :tu:

 

[jums]

Very nice forum and ur first try.keep it up