URL Change b/c new forum system

[m0rgulvale]

I recently moved my site from an old forum system, http://laserpointerforums.com/forums/YaBB.pl

the new site is located at http://laserpointerforums.com/laser_...forums_3/forum


I set it up so it redirects to the new site when users go to http://laserpointerforums.com


Questions:

1) The old yabb site has lots of links indexed in google. would it be better to just leave the old forum opened rather than have it redirect?

2) If so, should I change the title tag and keywords on the YaBB site so it doesn't conflict with new vBulletin site?


3) if i redirected yabb site to vbulletin site, would it 'leak' the old PR of the yabb site to the new vbulletin site?


4) what would you do if you were me in this situation


Thanks for your help!!

regards,

-avery

[jdk]

1.) You can set up 301 redirects

3.) Redirects will tell the search engine where the new pages are located and it will be reindexed accordingly, giving new pages the PR, etc.

4.) I would put the forum on http://laserpointerforums.com instead of messing with the directories, especially if you are redirecting users anyways. Why make them go to laserpointerforums.com/forums/forums when your domain tells them you are running a forum

[m0rgulvale]

hi jdk, thanks for your help


i don't know how to set it up so when a user goes to laserpointerforums.com it doesn't show the full URL path to vbulletin

how hard would it be to implement the suggestions you had above?

[jdk]

You would need to copy your files to /public_html and change the settings inside of vBulletin to show the correct URL.

As far as 301 redirects, do a search in Google for 301 redirects .htaccess and you will get plenty of results that will show you.

[m0rgulvale]

this is the current .htaccess file i am using:

Options -Indexes +FollowSymLinks

RewriteEngine On
RewriteBase /


redirect 301 /index.htm http://laserpointerforums.com/laser_...r_forums_3/for
um/