Author: Roy Eassa
Date: 12:22:31 08/15/01
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On August 15, 2001 at 04:52:01, John Alfred wrote: >On August 14, 2001 at 13:01:13, Roy Eassa wrote: > >>On August 14, 2001 at 07:40:47, John Alfred wrote: >> >>>Do you know of any attempts by anyone at a chess coprocessor daughterboard? >>>(apart from anything to do with Deep Blue) >>> >> >>There was a device called "The Chess Machine" that was sold as an ISA card for >>the PC. You ran a special app and this card "took over", essentially replacing >>your main CPU for the duration of your chess play/study. It had a nice >>mouse-based GUI and loads of features, and played quite well for its time (back >>in the DOS days). Its claim to fame was that it could turn a slow PC (e.g., >>PC-XT) into a strong chess program, and it lived up to that. As PC CPUs got >>faster, the Chess Machine lost its market and got quite cheap. >> >>I'm sure that's not exactly what you asked, but I wonder if somebody could pull >>the same (or similar -- true coprocessor?) trick off today, in a world with 1.5+ >>GHz main CPUs. > >Hi Roy, > >Thats interesting to hear! Any idea what processor it used and what the Elo >rating was? > I honestly don't recall the CPU. I do recall that it was amazingly strong for its time. And the GUI was unequaled. They touted it as about USCF 2450, I think, but all ratings of that time period have since been reduced. They actually had two models -- a later, more expensive one was double the speed, and thus higher rated, but caused heat problems. I had the "normal" one (which I actually still own if you know anybody who's interested in buying it!).
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