Author: Roger D Davis
Date: 18:41:47 05/13/99
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I agree absolutely that DB Jr. is the ultimate analysis engine...but even if it comes out at $100, there will still be room Chessmaster, and maybe Fritz, too, if I can be turned into a mass market product. However, as you noted, the price on Fritz might need to be cut to make it mass marketable. A DB Jr won't kill the market that Chessmaster sells into...that's all I'm saying. IMHO, if Hsu can pull it off (a big "IF", as some have said), then you've effectively killed Genius, MChess, Shredder, and any other non-Chessbased product, because only Chessbase has (1) the interface and (2) the resources to make a go of it in the mass market. Rebel is effectively out of it, because he's probably too far behind in interface development to come out with something truly competitive at this point. CSTal II has a nice interface, but far fewer features than Fritz, for about the same money. So they're out of it. My guess is that some of the top tier engines like Genius and MChess will fold and re-emerge as Chessbase products, should a Dr jr. really appear. Faced with either that or dying completely, the classical engines of the past will join forces under one interface, and their authors might even invest some of their money in Chessbase to help them make a go of it against Chessmaster, should that be required (I really don't know how big Chessbase is). I think the various authors will realize that it's better that than (1) no money, and (2) giving up their life work. The authors themselves might even join forces to contribute their ideas to the development of a single "superengine" that gradually becomes increasingly effective against DB Jr as P-III speeds ramp up over the next few years and multiprocessor platforms becomes the norm. So you might see Ed, Chris, Marty, Richard, Bob, Chrilly, Bruce, Amir, Christope, and others (who am I forgetting?), or some subset of these folks, all working together. Now that would be interesting!!!! I wonder if they can get along...Hehehehe. ;) Of course, it's all speculation at this point. Roger On May 13, 1999 at 15:43:05, Torstein Hall wrote: >On May 13, 1999 at 15:24:56, Roger D Davis wrote: > >>I agree that a DB Jr. kills the market for Rebel, Fritz, etc., but this market >>is really very small. The average consumer has no need for a $200 (speculation, > >The ChessBase programs are at DM 98. Thats more like $70!! I belive Rebel is in >the same price range! > >>not fact) DB thingy, so there will always be a market for a program that's cheap >>and has a great interface and is FUN to play. And fun doesn't equate with >>strength. Who wants to get crushed over and over again in the same style? >>Nobody. We buy programs that kick our butts and then dumb them down so we can >>beat them. So would you rather have a dumbed down Fritz or a dumbed down DB? >>Doesn't really matter, because when FUN moves into the foreground, the >>commercials and DB are equally strong...just strong enough to give the user some >>fun, and no more. > >It all depends what you are using your program for, I mainly use it for >analysing games, then you want to have correct lines in 0 time! > >But with a program comming out with superior hardware, its impossible for the >Fritzes and Rebels to get the income to continue developing! > >Torstein > > >> >>So...you're gonna see CM6000 (or 7000 or whatever) at the low end, and DB at the >>high end, if they can provide an interface that will compete with Fritz. If not, >>you're gonna see DB and Fritz split the high end, because there will be some >>people, like me, who just won't play anything with an aweful interface, no >>matter how bad it can crush me. Even if it plays like god. LOL. >> >>So if DB Jr is for real, and the interface is good, then I'd argue that only >>Fritz has a chance of surviving, since it is the only commercial that appears to >>have a chance of graduating into the mass market (extreme Chess did have some >>success). >> >>Roger >> >> >> >>On May 13, 1999 at 09:10:05, Torstein Hall wrote: >> >>>I think a DB chip will kill all the Fritzes, Rebels, Nimzos, Juniors and Hiarcs >>>of this world. What is the point in developing, or buying, something that is a >>>lot weaker than the "Micro Monster" :-) >>> >>>But perhaps it could be made with a programming interface, letting other >>>programs use it for search, and add their own evaluation functions etc.? >>> >>>Torstein
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