How can I move my Forum to another host ?

[wellmashed]

Ok.
I have an up and running forum of my own.
(not going to post the address on here coz i'll get shouted at LOL)

What I want to know is if i'm not happy with the functionality of the forum and I find another host with the extra functions I want then...

1. Can I transfer all the content to the new forum ?

2. How do I do it ?

3. What are the best forum hosts out there ?

Any help greatly appreciated.
Thanks.

[wellmashed]

Nobody else had this problem ?????????????

[Baldrick]

1. it depends what forum you are using...there are "converters" for many forums like to phpbb to vbulletin
2. read 1.
3. vbulletin is a very good forum...the new free phpbb 2.0 also looks nice.

[wellmashed]

Thanks m8.

I went to phpbb from the link at the bottom but there is no download for vers 2.0

The latest vers downloadable is phpBB v1.4.4, so if you know of an address link where I can d/load vers 2 I would much appreciate it.

Thanks again.

[Baldrick]

http://phpbb.sourceforge.net/phpBB2/

[wellmashed]

I just went and had a look at all that phpbb stuff and well....to be honest it is completely incomprehensible to me.

Way above my head.

The forum I have is just a simple but good looking (looks and works similar to this one) web based one that all I had to do is register an account with them and I got a web page forum with complete admin control.

No messing with all the sql stuff and anything else.
I wouldn't know where to start with it.

Does anyone know of a tutorial on this subject ?

Something like 'Forum Building For Numpties' or something.

Do I need my own server/how does one work?

I have no idea at all on what and how JAVA is and how it works so am I wasting my time looking at these type of forum's (phpbb/vbulletin).

To use this type of forum do I need to know about programming and such....?