Anyone else having trouble getting onto the other 4runner forum?

The Toyota-4runner.org forum has been extremely unreliable the past day, I get server busy and cloud flare error messages. This degradation of service has been happening slowly but surely the last 3 years I was on it, but this is the first time it became unreachable. Am I the only one experiencing the issue?

If you're asking "why you on that forum, you have this one", you probably have a 5th gen. That forum is hands down better for older generations, it has threads dating back 22 years, and has a the most resources on 4runners of any online resource anywhere on the internet. So it's a huge problem, especially if this is permanent.

 

@Bob Reports from the front indicate cracks in their defense. The time is nigh! We must strike while their servers are weak. There can only be one!!

OP agreed, I don't know anything about web forums, or how they work, but that forum has always been awful to use. By the time I'd get a web page to load on it, I could of already posted a whole write up with pictures here.

There's some great info over there, but holy shit it's less than ideal to get to.

 

Well, at least it’s not just me

 

I remember it being only a little worse than usual, but it's degraded fast. The UI isn't modern, but the only thing that really annoys me is that the original poster isn't given a tag when they respond to comments, so it's hard to tell if the person who said something fixed their problem is the person who started the thread or someone giving advice.

 

It's small quality of life things that makes this forum really shine. Honestly wish this system/format was used for all my hobbies/interests.

I remember back in '16 when I first got my 4Runner trying to use their site, opening pages and waiting like 30 seconds for each page to load. Or watching the 2nd or 3rd post load and it be a friggen ad.

 

I’ve gone on there a few times when following info I want from a search. I just use a different browser with all tracking, cookies, and ads blocked. It loads a lot faster that way because it’s not pulling 15 ads and 12 videos about “this day in history” before a thread title even loads. I’m exaggerating, but not by much. It’s a weird website business model. Seems counterproductive.

Similar to going on a merchant, website to buy something, and then being prevented from doing so by all the pop ups.

 

I think that's why it's a doomed forum. If I was a future 6th gen owner and I was thinking of which forum to join, would I join the slow forum with bad UI, or a modern one? Unless there is a huge back catalogue of of information on your vehicle, I see no reason to join it.

And since that forum doesn't have that advantage with new generation 4runners, it wont get new users. And so inevitably once the number of people with those older generations decline, so does the forum since it was only competitive because of the information it had. No information, no new users, no ads, no money, goodbye forum. That is why that forum will die at some point, but I don't want it to happen while I still need it. Forums in general have declined in favor of facebook groups, which sucks because the only good thing about facebook is marketplace.

 

I tried logging in many dozens of times. I have tried changing password to no help, lasted a few minutes. Next I will try a secure browser duck duck go when I have energy to overcome the likely frustration. T4R.org has provided much assistance over past few years with the wonderful information sharing of its members. It used to work seamless.

 

My obsession is the 5th gen 4Runner. So thanks for saving me time, it looks like I’m in the right place lol.

 

This forum has 220 pages on 5th gens and only 54 on 3rd gens, while the .org forum has 1001 pages on 5th gens and 2400 pages about 3rd gens. If this forum were as unpleasant to use as the .org forum is I wouldn't be a member. There is 0 reason to. I like redundancy though, so being a member of multiple isn't a bad idea.

I think it's evident this is the sister forum to tacomaworld, I wish they started this forum sooner because there would be more information distributed around. The 6th gen will test it the .org forum, because when the 5th gen came out there wasn't another dedicated 4runner forum competing against it. I hope for my sake they both flourish, but I'd be surprised if it did.

 

I wish I did but no. I wouldn't know how to contact anyone outside that forum anyway. There is a section about the site and issues/suggestions but I've never seen the site update anything in the 3 years I've been on it, so they're pretty hands off from my view.

 

Just joined myself after almost 6 years on the other site. So many issues, especially within the last month or two getting onsite. Have been viewing this site for a while, which is not only quick and responsive, there seems to be more interest over here.

 

I don't go there often, but they have a lot of good technical information.

 

Yes they do. It use to be a very good website with lots of information and interaction, but it seems to be declining.

 

Here is my .02, the members got to entitled. If a new member came on with a question that had of course been asked hundreds of times before they would attack, of course the newbe had no idea what the hell happened to piss everyone off. The old guard would let it happen and hence people did not want to be a part of the forum that degraded them. I for one complained about the site being unsafe, but to no avail, and many jumped ship. This forum is run by responsible people who enforce the rules and i am proud to be a member here. When a newbe comes on with a question, try to be helpful and not a dick. Thanks.

 

I did see this occasionally. Even experienced, long time owners may have a question that they weren’t up to date on.

 

I stopped using that forum when all of the pop-up ads would make using it cumbersome.

 

I started there. It has always been sluggish but became virtually unusable some time ago.

I don't bother any longer which is unfortunate. there is good information to be had.

 

Yes, its been like that since Friday, it is specifically why i signed up for this forum because that one has been down quite a lot the last few days saying server busy
That forum is so slow because of the ads, its practically unusable on a phone, sooooOOOO much crap constantly loading all over the screen, your phone wont even load the thread because of so many ads trying to load and play at the same time it bogs your phone down. I have good internet at my shop on desktop and it still takes 10-15 seconds for the home page to load, and get a thread to load, or a reply to post. Its borderline unbearably slow. There isnt enough traffic to warrant a "server busy" response, something else is going on, maybe they are hosted with AWS and bumped to a lower bitrate to be cheaper due to lower traffic. Not sure exactly but they have about 15-20 posts per day which is about what this forum is getting every 5 minutes.

 

I feel like the other forum has better tech info, however it's pretty much unusable on a mobile device so I rarely visit it unless something specific shows up in a search I'm doing.

 

They banned me in 2021 for being honest. They said I would be reinstated in 2022…..nothing yet, they can eat sit.

 

I never finished signing up there. I didn't want to play the silly game where you have to have so many posts before you could post??? Or however that works. The only thread I could find explaining how to get your post count high enough to post intentionally gave no helpful info to "make me think" if memory serves. People here patiently gave this clueless newb a lot of useful info that was quite helpful and thanks to you folks I'm well on my way with my 4runner. Fortunately I have a 5th gen.

 

I found that they said in a tweet that the site was "undergoing urgent maintenance", I don't have twitter so I don't have a screen shot to give. But the site seems to be up, and it's as slow as ever. Oh well.

The policy about getting comments before you can post is annoying, but it's antispam which I can understand. The people over there can get on my nerves when they say "use forum search" when I create a new thread. That sort of talking really pisses me off except for things that are truly asked often like oil changes. That happens less to me, I think because I have a good reputation now.

For 3rd gens there are more interesting builds. My god the ads on mobile are really obnoxious and gross, they take ads too far it's like being on Yahoo.

 

I joined that site before joining this one because it popped up first. But it was so glitchy and the pop-ups were just too much. I found 4Runners.com and never looked back. Great forum.

 

Next time it’s up I should probably save any data or ideas from there for later.

If anyone’s a fellow mobile device nerd, I was pretty sad when PreCentral/webOS Nation went down - all we have now is Internet Archive pages so if anyone wants to find old stuff there try their Wayback Machine.

 

Too many Ad Popups

 

There's another 4Runner forum?????

 

Folks on that forum are nicer.