RocketTheme is one of the most well established template providers for Joomla! In fact, one of their head contributors is a member of the core Joomla! development team. RocketTheme members tend to be fanatical supporters of the site, which says plenty about the user community that has built around the excellent after sales support supplied on their forums. Almost all the templates come with bonus plugins to get the best out of your Joomla sites, and they were first to proved an easy install solution (they call it their RocketLauncher) that not only installs Joomla on your hosting, but installs the template, components and modules along with demonstration content to get you on your way with very little bother.
What's Included: What Joomla Version do the templates work on - Joomla 1.x or 1.5 ? There is still a huge amount of Joomla sites out there using the legacy Joomla 1.x as there are some great modules still not converted for the new Joomla 1.5.
RocketTheme know this, so all of their new themes are both 1.x and 1.5 compatible. However if you are using Joomla 1.
5 and it's advanced features, you get an extra level of usability and features from your RocketTheme theme. If you like some of their older templates and are using 1.5 then don't worry, the older templates are being converted to 1.5 with added features.
How many templates are there and how often do they get updated? Heaps. As of June 2008 there is 67 and you get access to all of them. RocketTheme release a new template every month, and each one seems to better the previous.
That means if you sign up today for a year, before your membership runs out you will have access to up to 79 professional Joomla templates. How good are the templates and how much can I edit them? RocketTheme's templates, especially the past 12 months, have been some of the most versatile and customisable templates on the market. In fact, they sometimes suffer from being too complex due to the amount of customisations that can be done. They provide you with numerous variety in module styles and module positions, and this allows you to take the basic RocketTheme template and turn it into something unique for your site.
Want to make it even more custom? Then leave a message in the forum and have one of the developers help you out with your custom changes.On top of that all source files are supplied so you can easily customise the template further to suit your needs. What other features and bonuses are offered? Versatility 3 Rockettheme One of the best points is the previously mentioned user forum. Here you have access to not only the template developers, but hundreds of users who are all more than willing to help each other out.Also you have access to some specially modified versions of their templates suited to specific uses (video game web sites for example), as well as a collection of free Joomla modules.
How much does it cost and are their any restrictions on how I can use the template? RocketTheme offers three levels of membership * 3 months $50US * 12 months $75US * Developer 12 months 250 Discounts apply for renewal of memberships. It must be noted that on the basic memberships you are limited as to how many web sites you can concurrently use the templates. As stated in the RocketTheme Terms and Conditions :- Limited usage granted: Your membership grants you the rights to use the RTTC templates on as many concurrent sites as described in the matrix below. For example, a 3 month membership entitles you to use any RocketTheme template on a maximum of 2 sites. If you renew your membership for 1 year, you are entitled to use the templates on an additional 2 sites, for a maximum of 4 sites.
Even after your membership expires, you may continue to use the templates on these 4 sites, so the templates are not time-limited. If you wish to use a template for a non-profit site, they do not count against your maximum concurrent template usages. Now while I do not particularly like the limited license, it is standard fare across most template clubs.
Wookie's Opinion RocketTheme is probably my favourite template club at the moment. They provide toprate templates, with excellent features yet manage to maintain the ability to customise the site for your personal stylings. Many times I have been stuck for inspiration for a web site design and played around with a RocketTheme template and come up with something striking and individualunique. Although like most template clubs the limited license is a setback, I consider the cost worth it for access to such a great user and support community. If you do only join one Joomla Template club, it is hard to go past RocketTheme.
Chris Watson - Wookie to his friends is an IT professional and web site designer and runs his own business - StudioGTB. He offers a series of reviews on Joomla products at his website Wookie Reviews - http://www.wookiereviews.com/joomla-templates-clubs-review.html
