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There is no decent manual on how to get it to work.
Did you ask any support questions here about your issue with bbpress before posting this?
Did you look at the documentation and/or post a question on the support forum for bbpress at http://codex.bbpress.org ?
This is possibly a problem with your theme. for some themes/frameworks such as genesis and thesis there is a specific plugin available which can be installed to provide bbpress compatibility.
What theme are you using? If it is one hosted on the WordPress.org theme directory, start a topic on the WordPress.org forums asking about compatibility, if you are using commercial theme, ask on the vendors support forum.
