Author: James Robertson
Date: 16:40:51 07/07/04
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On July 07, 2004 at 19:27:11, Bryan Cabalo wrote: >Why doesn't everyone run their competitive chess programs with the same hardware >so that no single chess engine has a hardware advantage? > >It seems unfair to me that some competitors have access to faster and better >hardware. I would think of it as a science experiment where the only variable >is the chess engine itself and _not_ the hardware that its running on. That is >the real test. I want to see the real winner of this event competing on equal >hardware playing grounds. I think this would help with hardware uniformity in >future WCCC events. There has to be something in the rules about playing with >equal hardware. Maybe after this year the WCCC could supply the use of one >computer for each participant, or even quad opterons for each participant!! > >After all, we are just testing which chess search program is better, right? I think the purpose of the WCCC is to decide what _system_ can produce the best chess. With that idea in mind, any hardware/software combination may compete, as the goal is to bring the level of play as high as possible. The ICGA holds another event, the World Microcomputer Chess Championship (WMCCC) on years when there is no WCCC. This event evens out the hardware more, as only microcomputers may compete. This used to mean that only programs running on machines with single processors could enter, although they recently changed this. Still, the net effect of the restrictions of the WMCCC is that the hardware is more even. Think about other issues as well, such as the fact that certain programs rely on assembly for one processor, can take advantage of multiple processors, etc. Requiring all programs to have identical hardware is unreasonable. Hope this helps. James
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