Author: Ian Osgood
Date: 21:36:53 05/28/01
Go up one level in this thread
On May 27, 2001 at 19:41:04, Christophe Theron wrote:
>On May 27, 2001 at 16:55:02, Ian Osgood wrote:
>
>>On May 25, 2001 at 04:29:36, Christophe Theron wrote:
>>
>>>On May 25, 2001 at 01:29:11, Mike S. wrote:
>>>>
>>>>I think it would be interesting to see if Palm Tiger is able to win a longer
>>>>match against the NOVAG Sapphire II (I would expect that, but the Sapphire has
>>>>proven superior so far against other handhelds or travel computers, according to
>>>>info I have read from various sources).
>>>>
>>>>I wouldn't be surprised if the result would be quite narrow though...
>>>
>>>
>>>I really don't know and I would really like to know.
>>>
>>>The Sapphire II is rated 2012 by the SSDF (that means 2112 in the previous
>>>versions of the list, which is more accurate for lower ratings).
>>>
>>>So normally Tiger for Palm should be able to at least equal the Sapphire.
>>
>>So far, my Sapphire II has 2.5 - 0.5 against Palm Tiger at 5 minute games.
>>Tiger is overclocked to 28MHz on a Palm IIIe, both have hash tables on,
>>permanent brain disabled. Looks like the Sapphire II is out thinking Palm Tiger
>>by about a ply (3000 nps vs 500 nps).
>
>
>Tiger is not comfortable with games in 5 minutes on the Palm. That's too fast
>for my search algorithms.
>
>That's something I'll work on, but until I manage to improve on this, I would
>advice to play longer games to get more significant results.
Understood.
>> I plan to try some 30 minute games with
>>permanent brain later this week. (This would be easier if Palm Tiger had some
>>sort of serial interface so that I could adapt it to WinBoard like I have my
>>Sapphire II.)
>
>
>Unfortunately I'm not planning to work on this. Too few people would be
>interested in this. You would need to own two Palms, or a Palm and a compatible
>device (Sapphire?), that would attract probably no more than 10 customers. Too
>much work for too little interest.
I was hoping it might not be too much work, since you have already implemented a
terminal-like interface. But of course it is up to you.
And an update: at 30 minute sudden death, with hash and permanent brain, Chess
Tiger achieved two draws against SapphireII. In both games, Tiger obtained an
advantage in the endgame (R-N in one, Q-R in the other) but Sapphire II used
excellent endgame technique to hold the draw. Search depths seem to have
equalized (probably due to Tiger's modern techniques such as null-move etc.),
with the advantage going to whoever managed to predict the last move.
Next I'll do 10 and 15 minute games.
>>>>I think the Sapphire II could act as a kind of basic performance test for Palm
>>>>chess programs, in other words, they should beat it more or less clearly to be
>>>>competitive IMO, in terms of strength (in terms of functionality, the Palm is
>>>>certainly superior).
>>>
>>>
>>>There are not many chess programs which are going to be able to pass the test!
>>>:)
>>
>>Indeed. People forget that the SapphireII is near state of the art at its clock
>>speed (16MHz). Lang's and Morsch's programs in Mephisto units are its only
>>competitors.
>
>
>I do not know if the Sapphire processor can do more MIPS than the Palm's
>DragonBall. Anybody has info on this?
>
>I know the DragonBall takes a lot of clock cycles to process only one
>instruction, and I remember the Sapphire has some kind of RISC processor in it.
>Right?
It has an H8 processor ("RISC Style Technology" is silkscreened on the front of
the unit). Novag claims it is bitsliced to 32 MHz off of a 16 MHz clock. I
don't know enough about processors to know whether this is a straight 2x speedup
or not.
>>>>A Pocket PC, or Windows CE program running at 100...200 MHz just must beat the
>>>>Sapphire I think... at least if it is somewhat state of the art.
>>>
>>>
>>>Clearly. The Sapphire should be wiped away by a decent chess program running on
>>>StrongARM at 100 or even 200MHz.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> Christophe
>>
>>However, that program must be well written. For example, the strongest
>>commercial program for the PocketPC, PalmChess, on a 206MHz iPAQ loses (~35%)
>>against ChessGenius on a 28Mhz overclocked Palm. It would certainly lose
>>against SapphireII which is stronger.
>>
>>Crafty on the iPAQ is stronger than the SapphireII (hash tables help quite a
>>bit.)
>
>
>The difference in processor speed between the Sapphire and the StrongARM
>screams.
>
>
>
> Christophe
But the high quality of crafty, which takes full use of the processor and
decades of chess programming experience compared to PalmChess, is what makes the
difference. (For giggles, maybe I'll port SCP or TSCP to the iPAQ for a
strength comparison.)
Also remember that the Sapphire II is programmed in assembly down to the metal
and so gains in effective speed compared to a generic C program such as crafty.
Ian
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