Which software has the best default style

Well

Well you can always increase Left and Right margins, even using a fluid style to give it more of an appearance like it's a fixed-width style. Rather than the theme filling all their screen completely.

I think the view my members took was that if they wanted it fluid they wanted it all the way across with no margin (other than what already exists in the style itself), so that's the route we went.

Sadly they don't get to see my wonderful Christmassy background, but that's their lookout.

It's just funny because in the past I've used fixed-width with vBulletin 3 before using stock theme set at 760px at the time. I went to my dads who has a wide-screen monitor I bought when building the PC for him. My forum looked OK on my normal monitor, when I viewed it on my dads wide-screen it looked terrible and really out of place with so much wasted space left and right. Really not appealing to look at one bit.

Granted 760px now is narrow, but even going to 990px or slightly higher to suit 1024x768 screen res. It can still look the same now taking into account the increased screen resolutions used today with more modern wide-screen monitors. Most people now tend to use them, although I don't. The days old day when most people used a square 19inch monitor max with 1024x768 screen res are long gone. Monitors are very cheap to buy today, even 21 inch and much higher supporting a higher default screen res can be purchased for around 170-250 notes very easy.

XenForo looks the best from what I tested. Less ugly than the others, since it's not really perfect in my opinion, but still looks very nice out of the box

Honestly, you see the default style on so many sites with minor color variations and logo changes that I simply get sick of seeing it. When I first saw XenForo.com I was all like, 'oooooooh! aaaaahhh!'. Now when I go there, I'm like, '...'.

I hate everything else about IPB but i must admit their default design is by far the best cosmetically , whether it retains functionality ( which apparently it doesnt so i was told in a thread a couple of days ago ) i couldnt say for sure.

Xenforo's and vbulletins themes are horrible , however they both provide you with a "template" to work with , i.e both themes can be made to do practically anything using CSS alone.

IPB--->professional and clean
xF---->looks like marshmallow puffs and makes me hungry!
VB---->colors are easy on the eyes but it looks like something from 2003
MyBB->same as VB above
PHPBB>looks have improved but still same as above
WBB-->PHPBB on meth (tm)
SMF-->generally the same as VB but the gradients are from windows xp era look.
XMB-->looks stuck in 2003 but kinda has a charm about it.
PHP-Fusion>very good default color scheme and very easy on the eyes. but can use to spice it up a tad
Vanilla>very different kinda system so I cannot compare to the rest since it's meant to be minimal and blend into your site or have custom CSS.

For general ease for ALL users, I would have to say vB. This new fad of using pastels, shading and light colors is beyond irritating. For those who are older, it's difficult to read, and for those that are partially or totally color blind, it's a nightmare. Whoever is designing this stuff needs to be smacked upside the head and told to pull it out of their posterior.

Yeah the light colors bother me too. I always use darker colors on things. I have very sensitive eyes.

Xenforo for me I think alot of the other software default themes are very bland.

I seriously hate the default style (I use an add-on to customize XenForo.com so I don't have to deal with it), but on a styling standpoint it is the easiest to deal with .

XenForo is better.