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| From | Message | Posted by jibb666
podcaststyle.com
1/22/2008
15:37:12
Play online chess |  Subject: Is there a better interface than Fritz?
Message:
Hi all
I've played using Fritz 10, and it's very, very powerful, but I find that the interface is awful. Anyone know of any better chess programs out there that have a nicer interface (even if not technically as good)?
Any advice appreciated.
Jibb
| Posted by spurtus
podcaststyle.com
1/23/2008
01:42:10
Play online chess |
Message:
I'll second that!... the UI is terrible.... just terrible...
Depends what you want from a chess program though... strength?... analysis?... coach?... english advice?... tutorials?... database?... holographic pieces like in Star Wars?
Chessmaster is good, and you'll find Chessmaster 9000 pretty much just as good as any of the newer additions, if not simpler and better in some ways...
Spurtus.
| Posted by marinvukusic
podcaststyle.com
1/23/2008
05:06:48
Play online chess |
Message:
Erm... I have Fritz 8, and I like that interface. Did they change it?
———
U.S. doesn't medal in China — During a long and grueling chess tournament here in Ningbo, China, the U.S. team had real chances to capture a medal at the World Team Championship. But the competition proved too fierce, and we had to settle for tie for fourth place with 10 total points. However, after the complex tiebreak system, the U.S. ended up in sixth place, which is slightly better than our original seventh-place seeding. Still, it was a bit disappointing, as we squandered some golden opportunities. In a normal chess tournament, an individual receives one point for a win and a half point for a draw. The same was true for this event, but individual results were tallied up after each round and then teams were awarded points based ...
Posted by masros
podcaststyle.com
1/23/2008
09:00:43
Play online chess |
Message:
Arena is another good gui.You can find here www.playwitharena.com
———
Long Live the Chess King — Chess sometimes becomes a beautiful game even in the eyes of those who don't play it. Find a charming town, bring back its glorious past, turn people into chess pieces, invite kids and a jester and you can evoke magical moments. Every year since 2005, the picturesque Slovak town of Banska Stiavnica stages a game of living chess. It is a powerful, almost mystical, spectacle with human chess pieces dressed into medieval costumes and armed with spears and swords. They are moving on a big chessboard to the sound of drums and trumpets. On Saturday, July 16, they were recreating a live blindfold game I was playing against the legendary Hungarian grandmaster Lajos Portisch. The top-rated ...
Posted by kansaspatzer
podcaststyle.com
1/23/2008
11:13:38
Play online chess |
Message:
Can somebody recommend an interface that would work on FICS that you could play variants on?
———
Chess: Advance of the rook — We continue our examination of chess games by the master of positional play Ulf Andersson. Here he has built up a dominating position, principally by controlling the only open file. But a breakthrough is still needed: over to Ronan. RB: Everything points to an immediate 1 Rd6 – White's doubled rooks on the d-file, the pawn on e5 and the difficult position of the black knight on c6. But it does involve an exchange sacrifice and I have what must qualify as a near-phobia about giving up rooks for minor pieces. Still, if ever there was a time to get over my fears this surely has to be it. After 1…Bxd6 White could recapture with the rook, 2 Rxd6 but this doesn't seem to ...
Posted by wschmidt
podcaststyle.com
1/23/2008
14:29:24
Play online chess | What is it...
Message:
about Fritz's interface that you don't like?
———
Chess notes — A couple of weeks ago we wrote about anthropologist Robert Desjarlais’s musings in his work “Counterplay - An Anthropologist at the Chess Board’’ in respect to the mystical motives to play chess, an area of activity in great part outside of economic incentives. A recently developing illustration of playing for the love of the game is the monthly Grand Prix tournaments at the Boylston Club. There have been seven so far, and they offer only small prizes for those who have earned the most points at the end of the year. The entry fee is a mere $7 for club members and $10 for nonmembers. They have been immensely popular. Although these chess tournaments are not a draw for players dependent on chess for ...
Posted by mathemagician_
podcaststyle.com
1/23/2008
16:08:57
Play online chess |
Message:
Since the original quesion has already really been answered and I don't really want to start a new thread I assume it is O.K to ask this here.
I was looking to purchase Fritz 11, however when I was searching on amazon there appears to be similarly named products; Fritz Chess 11 by First Class Simulations and Fritz 11 by Chessbase. Does anyone have either/both, what is the difference (besides £10) between the two?
The part puzzling me is that Chessbase's version review is very similar to Fritz Chess 10, but Fritz Chess 11 has no product review.
Regards in advance.
———
Showdown in China Highlights Busy Month — There is no peak season for chess, but several overlapping tournaments are keeping top chess players busy. The events include the World Team Chess Championship, featuring 10 of the top national squads, in Ningbo, China; the Biel International Chess Festival in Switzerland; the Sparkassen Chess Meeting in Dortmund, Germany; and an elite invitational tournament for women in Hangzhou, China. The talented rosters include Magnus Carlsen in Switzerland; Levon Aronian, Sergey Karjakin, Vassily Ivanchuk and Teimour Radjabov in Ningbo; Vladimir Kramnik and Hikaru Nakamura in Dortmund; and Hou Yifan, the 16-year-old women’s world chess champion, in Hangzhou. Such a wealth of competition has ...
Posted by mathemagician_
podcaststyle.com
1/26/2008
13:35:48
Play online chess |
Message:
Scrap that question. I'm an idiot.
| Posted by ccmcacollister
podcaststyle.com
1/26/2008
14:51:41
Play online chess | MATHEMAGICIAN . . .
Message:
I'm sorry to hear that ... It must mean I am a bigger idiot since I don't see anything wrong with your Question?! But apparently you have figured it out, and I still haven't :(
Would you mind telling me the answer too? ... as I am really out of touch with Chess software and so have no idea at all what the difference might be. [Was the First Class Simulations product something that they bought license from Chessbase to revamp the program some way and resell it?! Or . . . ? ]
Thanks in advance if you would let me(us?) know. There may be others who are wondering too. Please advise . . .
Regards, Craig A.C.
| Posted by mathemagician_
podcaststyle.com
1/26/2008
15:08:58
Play online chess |
Message:
Upon closer inspection of both boxes (and previous Fritz Chess editions) on the amazon website they all have the same ChessBase logo in the bottom right. So I've assumed that they are identical products (or extremely similar products with some additional minor details) although my assumption ignores why one is x% off and the other isn't.
| Posted by jibb666
podcaststyle.com
1/30/2008
18:00:44
Play online chess |
Message:
Oh man - I typed a whole long reply and hit post - but I forgot that I only previewed the post. My mistake. This is probably why I need a simpler interface than Fritz :-)
In essence, Fritz is very, very good - but the whole interface I find completely disjointed. All the windows all over the shop. Trying to do some basic things like start a game from a set piece are over the top difficult in this.
I'm going to try chessmaster (thanks Spurtus).
| Posted by spurtus
podcaststyle.com
1/31/2008
05:46:32
Play online chess |
Message:
chessmaster is now out on the xbox360, downloaded and played some live games last night... its a really cutdown version though. It has a correspondance chess engine built in though.
| Posted by ogedei
podcaststyle.com
2/02/2008
11:28:35
Play online chess |
Message:
The last time I used a non-chessbase gui as my main analysis tool was about ten years ago. It was Chessmaster 5500. At that point (I'm sure it has improved a great deal) it was extremely bulky and rather annoying (talk about windows overlapping, jeez!), but I loved the database functionality. That lead me to try Fritz 6 (the latest at the time) and I found it very neat, tidy, and intuitive by comparison.
Granted, they haven't made any significant updates to the gui since then (Chessbase 8 and 9 were mere extensions of this Fritz 6 gui, as have been all the following versions of the Fritz family of guis). Can it be that in those ten years Chessmaster has improved to the point that it's better?
Still, I'll probably stay with the Chessbase stuff because I still find it very easy and intuitive for everything I want to.
(On a side note, I've tried Arena and like it's price, but found it rather homely and clunky).
| Posted by wschmidt
podcaststyle.com
2/02/2008
20:05:50
Play online chess | I think Chessmaster definitely
Message:
has an easier learning curve and there are some very good tutorials included. I think Fritz has better analysis and database functions. I'd be happy with
Fritz's interface if they'd just include a decent explanation of the functions. It takes awhile to sort out and it's not intuitive in many cases.
| Posted by spurtus
podcaststyle.com
2/03/2008
00:08:56
Play online chess |
Message:
'darkchess' is a superb variant you can play on xbox360 online.
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