If you don't mind paying a little vBulletin is one of the best packages you can get. You get a lot of back-end control that I haven't seen in the popular free forum packages like phpBB.

dailypress, you can do that with phpBB. You can enable or disable those features. Nearly every option in phpbb has a permission to go along with it.

Bill you should try phpbb3, forum permissions such as allowing or not allowing image posting can be drilled down to setting permissions for individual users on a individual forum basis if you wanted. In other words it couldn't have more options, in fact it is one thing that is criticized often about phpbb3 because it's a little complex but it's very powerful tool once you understand it.

The permission system in phpbb3 as I understand it is the most comprehensive of any forum package however it can be a bit complicated at first.

thanks guys. I did read other forums as well and lots of people recommended: vBulletin

for the free one I heard SMF (simple machine forum) is good as well.

I have started with phpbb and it seems like it will do everything I need it to do. Its free and is already set up on my host. The permissions seem complicated though but it's me being stupid, not phpbb being lacking

You should do the install yourself, technically installs done through control panels are not supported on phpbb.com however that rule is not strictly enforced.

The install itself is simple and stright forward so there really is no reason not to do it yourself.

phpbb had a bad rap because of version 2. phpbb3 is light years ahead of the old version and I've used all - phpbb2, phpbb3, and vbulletin. My preference is for phpbb3 although vbulletin isn't bad, I'm not too fond of the yearly fees.