We are upgrading to increase horsepower — moving to a server with a much faster processor, more storage, and 8 times more RAM. We hope you’ll see a difference in Forum speed, particularly during peak traffic periods. You should notice that searches run faster. During the upgrade process the Forum will be offline (not available) for 3-4 hours (if things go according to plan). There is a chance we might be offline for a longer period if there are unanticipated issues.

How You Can Help — Please Delete Your Old Private Messages
There’s a simple thing Forum members can do to help the Forum run faster and better — “pruning” your old private messages (PMs). Many thousands of Forum members are each retaining scores of private messages that are many years old. All those stale messages represent millions of database entries. Those millions of old PMs slow down the database and increase the load on our servers.

Please help us out by getting rid of your private messages more than six months old. This is a super-simple process you can do in a few seconds. The process is explained in this Forum Thread about Private Messages. Pruning your old PMs will help streamline the database, AND it will make your personal message archive open more quickly.

CLICK HERE for Instructions on How to Delete Your Old Forum Private Messages

The work is being done to streamline the database that handles the thousands of articles on the Daily Bulletin and the main site. In addition we will be installing new server software that should be faster yet easier to trouble-shoot. This should give us improved security and stability, and it should allow the Daily Bulletin and main site to run faster. You should notice that searches run faster.

So guys… don’t freak out if you cannot access Accurateshooter.com and the Daily Bulletin this upcoming weekend. God willing, all the necessary work can be done within a 24-town span on Saturday. If all goes according to plan, you can log in on Sunday without a hitch. All existing articles, photos, and resources will be backed up and restored — there will simply be a “time out” for 24 hours or so. IMPORTANT: You will still be able to use our Shooters’ Forum without interruption.

The switch-over was accomplished yesterday at 1630 hours (Pacific Time). All existing threads and posts have been preserved. Post counts and buy/sell feedback have also been retained. By all indications, everything is going well so far. Forum users report that pages load faster and searches take less time: “Things move along very fast now!” (Frank G. aka 40X Guy).

Join a Community of Nearly 17,000 Serious Shooters
If you haven’t visited our Shooters’ Forum yet, log on to Forum.AccurateShooter.com and check out one of the best Message Boards for precision shooters on the web. We now have nearly 17,000 Forum members including many National and International Champions. For example, this morning 2011 NRA National High Power Champion Carl Bernosky was logged in. And UK and World F-Class Champion Gary Costello (aka “GLC”) regularly visits our Forum. If you want advice from guys who really know their stuff — it doesn’t get better than that.

Set your bookmarks to http://www.accurateshooter.com/forum.

How to Log In to the New Forum
If you were registered in our Forum before, you can use the SAME User Name and SAME Password on the new Forum. However, on your first visit to the New Forum you’ll need to log-in TWO TIMES in a row to activate your account. The first log-in captures your name and password, and encrypts the info for higher security. The second log-in will activate your account. Thankfully, most people have figured this out. Note that your password is CASE SENSITIVE now. So, if it was all lower case before, you need to type it exactly that way.

Forum Attachments Now Working
When we launched this new Forum we imported over 3500 file attachments (mostly pictures), from the old Forum. That was a very difficult task and we had a few glitches. Now all the attachments are linked up successfully so the attachment feature is live and “open for business”. To attach files to a post you can either upload your image to an image host (such as Photobucket.com) then simply paste the code for the picture into your post. We recommend using a third-party image host for photos, as this will display your pictures full size (or any size you set during upload).

But, if you prefer, you can also upload your images as attachments. Your files will then be stored on our server. To upload image attachments, click on the “Additional Options” link below the text box. This will display the attachments option. Click “Choose” to find a file on your computer hard-drive. NOTE: Max file size for an attached file is 150kb so you may have to re-size your images before loading.

Once you’ve designated a file attachment, you can add more attachments the same way if you want. Then, when all the attachments are listed, click POST. Your files will be uploaded to our server and will appear in the post as 180-pixel thumbnails. Click on the thumbnail to see the full-size image.