Affiliate Marketing Secrets

I want to re-install PHPbb when I switch new web hosts, but I had several problems with the forums first off. I would like to make a record that this is PHPbb3 and it’s the most recent version available.
The problems lie with the spam-bots initially. They keep on coming and I had to keep banning them… and of course, that doesn’t help too much as more keep coming. So, I tried turning on “activation by e-mail”. Instead, it prevents EVERYONE from registering their accounts because it’s not sending any e-mails.
Next, I tried using the pre-installed reCAPTCHA that was included in my PHPbb download. Guess what? It doesn’t stop the bots. I was wondering if the reCAPTCHA was outdated or something and if I need to re-install it. And that is another problem: I have no idea how to re-install reCAPTCHA just to double-check if that has something to do with bots bypassing it.
Next, some of the registered users cannot log into the forums for some reason and instead they receive a message saying they exceeded the maximum number of tries. When they entered in the CAPTCHA to log in… Socket Error.
I want a specific set of forums where Guests may advertise their sites or make affiliating requests. I set those forums’ permissions so Guests should be able to post. Guess what happens when they tried posting? Socket Error.
So I feel like giving up and just re-install the forums when changing hosts. However, I want to keep the accounts and the posts intact but not the settings. Can anyone give me some support on any of these issues? Thanks.
P.S. Here is the link to the forums if you want to see the problems for yourself:http://pkmnstray.com/