Author: Moritz Berger
Date: 06:47:49 07/26/98
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On July 26, 1998 at 09:04:27, Mark Young wrote: >On July 26, 1998 at 08:52:14, Moritz Berger wrote: > >>On July 26, 1998 at 08:14:04, mike cooter wrote: >> >>>I know of its ranking on SSDF and the other list, but can someone provide me >>>with some feedback on Shredder 2? Likes , dislikes, style of play, other >>>features etc. >> >>likes: >>- Crafty-like logfiles >>- multiple variant mode >>- analysis include/exclude >>- native Windows 95/NT program with full auto232 support >>- nice opening book (I found some interesting novelties in it) >>- strong engine >>- useable 2D board >>- good EPD support >> >> >>dislikes: >>- F**%&! copy protection - sometimes wants original CD back multiple times >>within a few hours even when I didn't even reboot my NT 4 machine >>- hardware hungry (fast CPU) to maximize playing strength - the list of >>tournaments on www.computerchess.de where Shredder scored better than e.g. Fritz >>5 saw Shredder playing often on a Digital Alpha-PC/500+ Mhz. >>At Blitz or speed chess Shredder gets shreddered by other programs and humans >>alike if you don't have at least a very fast Pentium II machine. >>- no opening book editor >>- you cannot analyze entire games (i.e. overnight analysis, blundercheck)!!! >>This is a HUGE drawback for me. >>- no annotation or alternate lines inside a game possible >> >> >> >>Conclusion: If you have all other programs, Shredder is a nice to have but no >>mandatory purchase. If you don't already own Rebel, Hiarcs or M-Chess (DOS) or >>Fritz 5 + engines (Junior, Hiarcs) (Windows), go and get these programs first. >> >>Moritz > >I was thinking of getting Shredder 2 but it sounds like I should hold off even >though I have the other programs. What about powerchess98, I was watching it >play ferret and it won the the 2 games I seen it play at game 30 min. >Powerchess98 was just running on a P 166 and Ferret on a alpha 533. Is this >program really that strong? Powerchess has the latest W-chess engine from Kittinger. There were some reports here (from Fernando?) that it sometimes manages to compromise your system configuration up to a point where your machine wouldn't boot any longer. This makes Powerchess 98 a big no-no for me, sadly. Also, the other features (or lack thereof) didn't sound particularly tempting ... Shredder is by no means a bad program, I use it quite frequently. One thing I forgot to mention: It comes with all 5 man endgame tablebases from Ken Thompson. It doesn't probe them during search but tries to deliver "best" moves from the tablesbases by not only probing them but selecting most difficult moves against the opponent. Some pro-Shredder propaganda can be found at http://www.computerchess.de/shredder/home_e.html Shredder lacks many bells and whistles (chess tree, sophisticated handicap and sparring modes, correspondence analysis, blunder coach, proper database support (CBF, PGN, CBH), multiple variants and annotations, game analysis, opening book editor) that e.g. Fritz 5 offers, but the basic features work well enough (if you can live with the copy protection bugs). Shredder has a Fischer increment blitz clock and supports some kind of Fischer Ramdom chess (shuffle chess). Moritz
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