Hi all, I've been working on some graphical THEMES for the website. Which one of these themes is your favorite?

Please use the Theme Selector to the right (under the Ride of the Month) and try each theme. Tell us what you think and vote in the poll.

Now, please don't just vote based on the appearance. Take these considerations in mind before you vote for your favorite:

1) Appearance - How does it appeal to your eyes.

2) Speed - Do you care about speed and load-times or is that trival to you?

3) General Use - Does the theme have the options that you want to see?

4) Navigation - Is the navigation structure something you like?

5) Layout - Does the layout (similar to navigation) work well with your 'surfing' style?

6) Tabs - Are tabs at the top of your screen important or do you like to use the menu at the left?

Most of these themes are functional with only a few minor bugs. I don't plan to fix these until we've had a chance to vote on the best theme, so, please don't send bugs to me just yet. I also would like to know your thoughts about the themes. Comments are welcome.

And remember, the basis of this poll will result in our new look! So, take your time and evaluate the themes............

Well,

I've become a little smarter and figured out to use the SELECTOR, as stated, to access each new theme. However, with each selection all I got was a message telling me I can't view this file!!!!? Again, what's up? Help me get smarter!

Try this, go to your control panel (my info) and change the theme there.

I like the "XP" theme. The "To the max" theme was a little too brightly colored for my tastes. Although, the vbP red was kind of cool, also.

Are you using the selector from the main page? Try that and let me know what happens. You can also change your theme within the user control panel options.

Here are my thoughts on the themes....

tabby - A cool theme with the tabs, but, is a little too boring. Can be slow to load at times. Might be difficult to add more tabs across the top w/out affecting structure. Our first tab theme, but, tabmenu might be a better theme.

tabmenu - A great blue theme that fits our appearance. It's quick to load and doesn't use too many graphics. However, it's got the typical 'blocky' look to it. Has a metallic look to the menus on the main page which is somewhat fitting to our car site. Nice tab-style navigation that allows for future expandability with new tabs.

ToTheMax - An excellent tab-style theme with some awesome colors. A metallic look that fits us nicely. I really like the tab-style themes because it allows the user to access areas quickly. This theme is pretty slow to load because of all the graphics, but, the load time is similar to XP. Would be difficult to create new tabs. News on the main page does not have the 'blocky' appearance.

vbpred - A very quick simple theme. Colors match our logos and existing theme nicely. Not much to this theme and it does not have tabs. An older theme with a simple feel. Not too cluttered. Has the 'blocky' feel on the main page and does not contain graphics.

XP - Our old theme come back to revisit the new structure. This is a nice simple theme, but, is very slow to load. Simple, but, not quick. Has a simple navigation structure that does not support the tab style and limited links. Forces the user to search for options unless they are added as new buttons across the top (which can be tricky).

In conclusion, all of these themes are excellent and would fit us nicely. But, the tab themes seem to be the most flexible for navigation and future expansion. While I really like the ToTheMax theme a lot, it's slow because it needs to load so many graphics. The XP and red themes are good, but, they are too simple for my taste and don't provide a great navigation structure. red is the fastest theme so far. The TabMenu gets my vote because it fits with my taste the most. It matches our 'colors', it's fast, and it can be enhanced later.

If we don't care about speed, then I'll go with ToTheMax. but, my vote at this time is for tabmenu.

Some of you might ask why not keep all the themes? Simple answer, maintenance. Take the amount of themes we are using and each one will need to be changed/tested every time a modification is made to the site.

[m]

I like the tabmenu the best also. It has the appearance we have now with much brighter colors and more room for expansion if we get advertisers to post on the site.

The ToThe Max would be my second choice.

For those of us still in the "dark ages" of dial-up, the load times are pretty much all the same. Of course, we will have to take into account, with the possibility of sponsors ads on the main page, we will need to look for something that loads a bit quicker now, if we end up with more on the main page, it could end up slowing things down too much later..

I still like the idea of the tabmenu as our default, with the possibility of having perhaps the ToTheMax as an optional theme that members could select if they choose. It is going to rquire a lot of work to do this, but perhaps we can "volunteer" some help for you to do this in the near future......:cross-eye

Mike,

Really like to the max for colors and looks. They all seem to load at the same speed on DSL so can't comment there.

To The Max

:rambo:

I like the main style......... no I love it! This style combined with the colr scheme of vbpred would be cool I think. Everything loads faster than my wife can buy shoes when they are on sale!

Dwight

I like the tabmenu theme best, for these reasons:

Appearance - the colors make it a lot easier on my eyes than XP; I like the well-defined sections on the Home page ("blocky" is what Mike called this) vis-a-visl To The Max, which I would call a rather "cluttered" or "messy" style.

Speed - as was noted previously, I don't notice any slowness with DSL, so I will leave this open to those with dial-up connections to debate.

General Use, Navigation, & Layout - perhaps I missed something, but they didn't seem much different from one another in terms of these features.

Tabs - the tabs of the vbpRed and XP themes are WAY too small, while those of tabmenu seem just about right.

Other:

If the color theme of To The Max was carried through the headers ofthe panels, I might like it more. but it seems to have to much "shades of gray", and as I noted above, the main menu areas are not well defined.

XP's colors are too bright, and the tab buttons at the top are too small.

vbpred is just ugly, IMHO.

And that's my $.02!

gary