Full Review: Millsberry Support

Sep

2010

Name of the Forum: Millsberry Support
Address: http://www.millsberrysupport.com/
Area's you wish the reviewer to review: Every Area Please

Our users have posted a total of 30086 messages

We have 531 registered users

May I please ask if an official reviewer review this please. Thanks!

1 Jophy, on 24/09/2010 at 12h19

I'll get this done soon Wink

2 Jophy, on 25/09/2010 at 04h58

Millsberry Support

First Impressions - Rating: Very Poor

When I first cam in to the forum, it led me to the portal, starting things up here, not to be rude here but I noticed that you have this disorganized looking portal, it's also laggy when I first cam there since there are lots of things loading up there like the music player, the flash message etc.. First of all, I don't see the purpose of placing a chatbox on the portal, I personally suggest it to be placed at the index at the bottom, it'll look more settled there, also, I noticed in the portal that it's width is too big, I would have to scroll to the left to see the remaining messages there, I also don't see the purpose of adding a music player there, I don't think it fits for a support forum like this, try to reduce things up on the portal to make it look more professional, ok, when I came up to the index, I'm still seeing the chatbox, I suggest placing it at the bottom or just removing it, I don't see it's purpose since this is a support forum, discussions should be on the forums, until I finished scrolling to the bottom of the index, I still feel disorganized around the atmosphere of the forum, the widgets you have on the left side can also be found on the portal, I don't see the reason to place it again on the index, it packs things up on the index which doesn't look good, also, I'm kind of confused on the colors of the forum, there are some light colors, there are some average colors and there are some dark colors, I'll explain more about this later. Try to sort things out.

Graphics & Layout - Rating: Poor

I'll start mainly with the graphics, starting with the major graphics, the banner looks good, it blends well to most of the colors on the forum which definitely looks professional, the fonts are just fine too, although I would suggest adding a logo on the banner too, it looks a little bit plain for me, also, one thing I noticed here is that the 'Help' text on the banner blocks a message behind it('Millsberry'), try to adjust that font and it'll look better, for your navigation bars, I think they look fancy and good but they're too big for me, I think reducing the size would make it look better and keep the navigation bars in one line which looks good, other than that, they look good, for the forum icons(new post, no new post & forum is locked), they're also fine, nothing wrong with the icons.

Let's take a look at the content & organization of the categories & forums, first of all, I think you have this nice set and amount of forums, all of them seem to relate to the forum except for the off topic category/forums, the organization of categories & forums are fine, so I don't see any thing wrong there, nice work, I'm just wondering for your 'multi-forums in one' category, the table there looks odd, try to remove it, it'll make it look more professional. Overall, the organization and content is good.

Now for the lay out & color scheme, as I'd just mentioned, just fix the table at your first category for the lay out and it'll look good, ok, now, as I'd mentioned from my first impression, I'm kind of confused with the colors of the forum, to be straight to the point, you have this 3 kinds of colors overall, the lavander for your background, the blue for the body of the forum and black for the 2nd background of the forum, I'd say that dark colors won't work for a light background like lavander, it looks alternating and looks like a mess with the colors, try to partner the background of the forum, I suggest a gray background for the forum, I guess it'll look better.

Forum Activity - Rating: Average

from the index view, I noticed that the forum has kind of average activity when it comes to posting, and that's still considered a good rating, it's also good to notice that the forum has this latest post being made 'Today' on some forums, so that's a good work, the amount of posts on the forums are fine too, the total amount of posts(30,231 messages) is considered brilliant, so that's a nice achievement.
For the users activity, there are several members that logged in the past 99 hours, I guess the users activity is not that great, try to improve more on this criteria, keep the members active by creating contests, sending e-mails etc.

Staff & Usergroups - Rating: Average

First of all, I liked the set and amount of groups you have on the forum, it's not that many which looks good, and professional, every groups seems to have a nice use for the forum, I just don't know what's the use of having GFX group/staff since this is a support forum not a graphics forum.
Now, for the amount of staff members, starting with the admin group, 3 admins is fine for a much populated forum, but I don't think you need to increase or add more, 3 is the maximum, there are no supreme mods, I think it's just fine even if you won't add here since the activity of the forum is not that great and there are admins and support mods to moderate the forum, there are no GFX, as I mentioned above, you can disband this group since this is not a graphics forum.

Originality & Unique Quality - Rating: Average

The things I saw unique on the forum is the flash message on the portal and the navigation bars, altough as I'd mentioned about those things above, they can look better for some aspects, like making the navigation bars a little smaller.

Would you like to share your review to others? Grab the code!:

Code:: [center][img]http://i37.servimg.com/u/f37/13/67/77/07/yfr214.png[/img] [size=18][font=Trebuchet MS]Millsberry Support[/font][/size][/center] [img]http://i37.servimg.com/u/f37/13/67/77/07/red12.png[/img] [size=16][b][color=#932222]First Impressions[/color][/b][/size] - [b]Rating: [color=brown]Very Poor[/color][/b] [list][font=Trebuchet MS]When I first cam in to the forum, it led me to the portal, starting things up here, not to be rude here but I noticed that you have this disorganized looking portal, it's also laggy when I first cam there since there are lots of things loading up there like the music player, the flash message etc.. First of all, I don't see the purpose of placing a chatbox on the portal, I personally suggest it to be placed at the index at the bottom, it'll look more settled there, also, I noticed in the portal that it's width is too big, I would have to scroll to the left to see the remaining messages there, I also don't see the purpose of adding a music player there, I don't think it fits for a support forum like this, try to reduce things up on the portal to make it look more professional, ok, when I came up to the index, I'm still seeing the chatbox, I suggest placing it at the bottom or just removing it, I don't see it's purpose since this is a support forum, discussions should be on the forums, until I finished scrolling to the bottom of the index, I still feel disorganized around the atmosphere of the forum, the widgets you have on the left side can also be found on the portal, I don't see the reason to place it again on the index, it packs things up on the index which doesn't look good, also, I'm kind of confused on the colors of the forum, there are some light colors, there are some average colors and there are some dark colors, I'll explain more about this later. Try to sort things out.[/font][/list] [img]http://i37.servimg.com/u/f37/13/67/77/07/purple11.png[/img] [size=16][b][color=#9507c9]Graphics & Layout[/color][/b][/size] - [b]Rating: [color=olive]Poor[/color][/b] [list][font=Trebuchet MS]I'll start mainly with the graphics, starting with the major graphics, the banner looks good, it blends well to most of the colors on the forum which definitely looks professional, the fonts are just fine too, although I would suggest adding a logo on the banner too, it looks a little bit plain for me, also, one thing I noticed here is that the 'Help' text on the banner blocks a message behind it('Millsberry'), try to adjust that font and it'll look better, for your navigation bars, I think they look fancy and good but they're too big for me, I think reducing the size would make it look better and keep the navigation bars in one line which looks good, other than that, they look good, for the forum icons(new post, no new post & forum is locked), they're also fine, nothing wrong with the icons. Let's take a look at the content & organization of the categories & forums, first of all, I think you have this nice set and amount of forums, all of them seem to relate to the forum except for the off topic category/forums, the organization of categories & forums are fine, so I don't see any thing wrong there, nice work, I'm just wondering for your 'multi-forums in one' category, the table there looks odd, try to remove it, it'll make it look more professional. Overall, the organization and content is good. Now for the lay out & color scheme, as I'd just mentioned, just fix the table at your first category for the lay out and it'll look good, ok, now, as I'd mentioned from my first impression, I'm kind of confused with the colors of the forum, to be straight to the point, you have this 3 kinds of colors overall, the lavander for your background, the blue for the body of the forum and black for the 2nd background of the forum, I'd say that dark colors won't work for a light background like lavander, it looks alternating and looks like a mess with the colors, try to partner the background of the forum, I suggest a gray background for the forum, I guess it'll look better.[/font][/list] [img]http://i37.servimg.com/u/f37/13/67/77/07/orange12.png[/img] [size=16][b][color=#e2a718]Forum Activity[/color][/b][/size] - [b]Rating: [color=green]Average[/color][/b] [list][font=Trebuchet MS]from the index view, I noticed that the forum has kind of average activity when it comes to posting, and that's still considered a good rating, it's also good to notice that the forum has this latest post being made 'Today' on some forums, so that's a good work, the amount of posts on the forums are fine too, the total amount of posts(30,231 messages) is considered brilliant, so that's a nice achievement. For the users activity, there are several members that logged in the past 99 hours, I guess the users activity is not that great, try to improve more on this criteria, keep the members active by creating contests, sending e-mails etc.[/font][/list] [img]http://i37.servimg.com/u/f37/13/67/77/07/blue11.png[/img] [size=16][b][color=#0f6ec7]Staff & Usergroups[/color][/b][/size] - [b]Rating: [color=green]Average[/color][/b] [list][font=Trebuchet MS]First of all, I liked the set and amount of groups you have on the forum, it's not that many which looks good, and professional, every groups seems to have a nice use for the forum, I just don't know what's the use of having GFX group/staff since this is a support forum not a graphics forum. Now, for the amount of staff members, starting with the admin group, 3 admins is fine for a much populated forum, but I don't think you need to increase or add more, 3 is the maximum, there are no supreme mods, I think it's just fine even if you won't add here since the activity of the forum is not that great and there are admins and support mods to moderate the forum, there are no GFX, as I mentioned above, you can disband this group since this is not a graphics forum.[/font][/list] [img]http://i37.servimg.com/u/f37/13/67/77/07/green11.png[/img] [size=16][b][color=#3acd0d]Originality & Unique Quality[/color][/b][/size] - [b]Rating: [color=green]Average[/color][/b] [list][font=Trebuchet MS]The things I saw unique on the forum is the flash message on the portal and the navigation bars, altough as I'd mentioned about those things above, they can look better for some aspects, like making the navigation bars a little smaller.[/font][/list]

3 Rideem3, on 25/09/2010 at 18h03

Thank you for your review. I will be putting your information to good use.

4 KingOfSports, on 25/09/2010 at 18h19

Locked and Archived.