Hello.

I think it is a important point for developing.
Not any one board has a good internal search engine. If you have large boards, it's a problem for members to find the right topic.
That is the point where you can work on it!
Make improvements to the search algorythm.
Make custom profile fields searchable.
Make the topic description searchable.

Thats the weakest point at every board, the search engine. You can be the first one that kick ass. ^^

Unfortunately we have no choice but to install Sphinx modification.

it should ship with a sphinx api, currently its a modification.

Don't worry...expect improvements to the search engine overall with 3.0 ;)

As good as sphinx?