By registering and logging in, you will be able to use the Forums search engine, post, and edit your member profile and preferences. You will get the most out of your time here if you change your profile and preferences to suit your individual tastes. There are many options in your preferences to make your experience here more enjoyable, so please take a few moments to try the various settings. Also, only users who are registered and logged in can take advantage of the "New Posts" feature upon each visit.

Yes. In fact, when you are logged in at MacFixit or VersionTracker you should be logged in here at the Forums as well.

Yes. Cookies are used to remember your login information as well as what posts you have read during your current session. Without accepting cookies some functions won't work properly.

Click the "log in" link in the blue header at the top of any Forums page. Then enter your Email address and Password in the fields that appear and click the Login button. (Keep in mind that the password is always case-sensitive. This means that the software considers "S" and "s" to be different characters.)

This checklist may help you successfully log in:

1) Ensure that your browser is set to accept cookies and that JavaScript is enabled.
2) Make sure you are entering your password correctly; passwords are case-sensitive.
3) If you see "You are currently logged in as your-email-address" in the blue header at the top of the page but the Forums title bar shows "You are not logged in" or you cannot post, click the "Logout?" link in the blue header and then log back in.
4) Delete all MacFixItForums, MacFixIt, VersionTracker and iPhoneAtlas cookies and clear your browser's cache, then log in.
5) If you are not sure you're using the correct password and you have access to the email address your account is registered under, you can click the "Lost password?" link in the blue header and follow the instructions to reset your password.

If the above steps don't resolve your Forums login issue, please contact CNET TechTracker Support at http://support.versiontracker.com for assistance.

It's a system-generated User Title based on your post count. You will progress through the various levels according to the cumulative number of posts you have made.

Everyone has a title within the forum. You will notice the title below the username in each post. Some titles are automatically assigned based on the number of posts a user has made, and some titles are assigned by the forum owner to denote official representatives of the company or other VIPs in the forums.

0	New User
25	Mac User
50	MacScribe
100	MacWriter
200	MacReporter
500	MacJournalist
1000	MacAuthor
2500	MacMaster
5000	MacWizard

If you have forgotten your password and have access to the email address your account is registered under, click the "Lost password?" link in the blue header at the top of any Forums page and follow the instructions to reset your account password.

You may change your password any time by following these steps:

1) While logged in, click "My Stuff" in the Forums navigation bar and select "Profile" from the menu.
2) Click the "VersionTracker - Account Settings" link.
3) Click the "Change Password" link.
4) Enter current and new passwords in the spaces provided. (Keep in mind that passwords are case-sensitive.)
5) Click the "Save Password" button.

For detailed instructions, see How to Post a New Topic

No, the image tags are disabled.

No. File attachment has been turned off for these boards.

See the CNET Networks Terms of Use.

Click "My Stuff" in the Forums navigation bar and select "Profile" in the menu.

In the Forums navigation bar click "My Stuff" and select "Preferences" in the menu to edit your settings.

There are many aspects of how the Forums are displayed that may be customized. You can choose how many posts are displayed on each page, the time format you want to use, and much more. Once saved, these become your default settings. You may edit these preferences again at anytime.

The first post of a given topic establishes the subject by which all subsequent replies will be known. It's therefore important to get the subject right from the outset. Make it as descriptive and as specific as possible. For example, "LCD burn-in questions" is much better than something completely generic, such as "Newbie needs help!" Not only is it more likely to elicit a response, but it'll also make it much easier for all posts in the topic to be subsequently located.

One of the key benefits of the discussion board format is that it enables commonly asked questions to be answered once, for the benefit of all. Before posting your question, it is always worth checking to see if it has already been asked - and answered! You can do this via the "Search" link in the Forums navigation bar (you must be logged in to see the Search link). You can perform a quick keyword search, or click on the "Advanced" button to search by more specific criteria. Various options are available, both for how the search term is specified and for controlling how many forums you want to search. This is where the specificity of topic subjects is important, making it much easier to locate precisely what it is you're after from a list of search results.

No, cross-posting the same topic in more than one forum or thread here is not allowed.

Private messaging has been disabled in the Forums.

If the tags are showing up in your text or you're getting a link but it's to "http:///", you're including some unwanted spaces in the syntax. Avoid any intervening spaces, and everything will work fine.

Users can edit their own posts up to 24 hours after they are made. Where the change is substantial, it is courteous to mark the post as edited so as to alert readers to the changed content. For cosmetic changes, it's better not to do so.

Let the Forums Administrator or a Moderator know - he/she will be able to move it for you.

There are 2 ways that this can be configured on a per-forum basis. If HTML is On then you will see HTML is On and you can use normal HTML in your posts. If UBBCode is on you will see UBBCode is On.

The following tags are available for your use if UBBCode is enabled:

Text Formatting
[b] text [/b] = Makes the given text bold.
[i] text [/i] = Makes the given text italic.
[u] text [/u] = Underlines the given text.
[s] text [/s] = Will post your text with a line through it (strike through).
[color:red] text [/color] = Makes the given text red.
[color:#00FF00] text [/color] = Makes the given text green.
[size:11pt] text [/size] = Will change the size of the text to 11pt.
[font:Georgia] text [/font] = Will post your text with the specified font.

Links
[email] joe@email.com [/email] = Makes the given email address clickable.
[email= joe@email.com ] text [/email] = Makes the given email address clickable.
[url] link [/url] = Makes the given url into a link.
[url= link ] title [/url] = Makes the given title into a hyperlink pointing to link.

Code Tags & Highlighting
[code] text [/code] = Surrounds the given text with pre format tags.
[php] text [/php] = Passes the text through the PHP Syntax Highlighter
[highlight] text [/highlight] = Will highlight your text.
[spoiler] text [/spoiler] = Will wrap your text in a spoiler container. Users must click a button in order to see this text, thus giving them the ability to specify if they want to read the item.
[spoiler:warning] text [/spoiler] = Will wrap your text in a spoiler container and allow you to specify the warning message displayed. Users must click a button in order to see this text, thus giving them the ability to specify if they want to read the item.

Text Alignment
[align:left|center|right] text [/align] = Will align the text in the direction defined.

Misc.
[list]
[*]Item 1
[*]Item 1
[/list] = Makes a bullet list. [list=A] or [list=1] will make order/numbered lists. Other options include: circle, i, I, a, A, 1, disc, square.
[quote] text [/quote] = Surrounds the given text with blockquote and hr's. This UBBCode tag is used for quoting a reply.
[quote=username] text [/quote] = Surrounds the given text with blockquote and hr's. This UBBCode tag is used for quoting a reply. The username specified will be shown as quoted.

Only Administrators and Moderators can create polls.

In the Forums navigation bar, click "My Stuff" and select "Preferences" in the menu. You can set the number of posts displayed on each page to anything between 1 and 99. By default, this is set to 10.

Click "My Stuff" in the Forums navigation bar and select "Posts" in the menu.

The "Notify" button is for alerting Moderators to misplaced topics, cross-posts, spam or other such content.

No. File attachment has been turned off for these boards.

(This is a duplicate entry in the FAQ; it's a bug.)

Subscribing to a Forum
Enter the Forum and Select "Add Forum to Watched Forums" from the "Forum Options" dropdown.

Subscribing to a Topic
Enter the Topic and Select "Add Topic to your Watched Topics" option from the "Topic Options" dropdown.

Managing Watch Lists
Select "My Watch Lists" from the "My Stuff" dropdown, from here you can select the type of List that you wish to edit and by clicking the "Edit Watched Topics" (or "Edit Watched Forums" or "Edit Watched Users") link you can remove them or toggle the "Email Notification" option.

Toggling EMailed Watch Lists
See the above "Managing Watch Lists" directions.

Toggling the Default "EMail Watchedlist" Options
Select "My Preferences" from the "My Stuff" dropdown. From here you can manage the "By default should anything added to your Watch Lists be emailed to you?" option.

The red numbers in parentheses indicate how many new topics (or posts) have been made since your last visit to the forums.

An upgrade or other maintenance is currently in progress.

Until completed, you can login, browse and search normally.

However saving content is disabled in order to minimize the outage time. That unfortunately includes creating/editing posts, profiles, etc.