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I've been interested for a while about getting a small chess game for playing and studying. I have Fritz, but I want something that I could just pull out while I reading a book, enter a position and practise it. Portability is key, as I want to do it outside, traveling, or just off somewhere in the house.
I want something the size of a handheld video game. it doesn't have to be a genius (I'm only rated 1700), but is shouldn't be a fish either. Something that could play around 2000 or better would be just fine.
My other requirement is "cheap". I want it to be less than $100.
Last Christmas I got an Excaliber LDC chess game. Initially I thought "perfect". But the display turned out to be terrible! You couldn't even tell where the pieces were.
So I've been thinking about this and I came up with a couple of ideas. I'm wondering if anyone has tried any ot these ideas, and what works and what doesn't. PLease let me know.
Option 1: Find a "gently used" Palm pilot, and download a program called "Chess Genius". I heard that it's not bad.
Option 2: Get a Gameboy Advance and a copy of Chessmaster.
Any thoughts on these concepts? Or does anyone have a better idea?
I have a Palm Zire 31 (no idea how much they are now - only available used I presume) and Chess Tiger - very nice piece of software. The Palm is quite a useful PDA... too bad they are out of that business, but software is still around for them and units are avail used/ebay etc.
I have a Palm Vx that was great until it started the wandering cursor alignment problem. Then I got laid off, so I never fixed it. However, I believe there is a fix out there for it, so if you find that fix, I can re-initialize the thing, and you could get Chess Tiger, etc.
I'm not sure about Chess Genius being a good idea, as, if I remember correctly, I could beat it almost whenever I really tried, and I'm U2000. Maybe it was another software?
I also have 2 chargers, and all the original stuff, like cables, PC disk, documentation, etc.
Another super-cheap option would be to get a chess game for your cell phone if you have one. Most phones have compatible chess games, I've tried them before and they can beat me (1750) easily. The interface isn't as nice as the other options but it'll only cost you $5 or less to download and there's nothing extra to carry around.
I have a Palm Zire 31 (no idea how much they are now - only available used I presume) and Chess Tiger - very nice piece of software. The Palm is quite a useful PDA... too bad they are out of that business, but software is still around for them and units are avail used/ebay etc.
Palm is still in business. Ive had my Palm TX since christmas and it has been one of the best hi tech purchases ive made. I use Chess Genius but you can also get chess tiger and hiarcs. Ive also got a Nintendo DS with the latest chessmaster and its a pretty decent setup but I don't think it is rated much over 1800.
Personally I use chess genius / Palm to go through most of my games, its handy and is rated about 2400 so its analysis is pretty decent.
Well, I guess technically Palm is still in business, but you would be hard pressed to find any of them around in stores like Staples etc. Perhaps there are still some around. Chess Tiger is not easy to beat at all... at least on my Palm.
The obsession people have with cell phones and convergence (one device doing lots of things) has gotten insane, but I haven't tried a chess program on my kind of crummy just-a-phone...
My complaint about Monroi always was that it was basically a single-function device (and not a cheap one either). If they had produced software that ran on a PDA - that would have been very cool. (say Windows CE based or Palm - although all these beasts are quite different inside).
I understand why they went the proprietary route, but the consumer is the loser (I cannot justify one purely because the price is prohibitive).
Mephisto has a neat unit called the Maestro. Advantage that you have over what you bought last time is that the screen is back-lit which makes it much easier to see the pieces.
We are out of stock on this item right now but I expect more in by July 18th. It sells for $99.95 plus taxes
As for the Excaliber line... several years ago I bought the Touch Chess - only after fooling around with it for a while I realized the pieces were very hard to distinguish and the display was problematic in regular light. A very bad piece of work. Almost forgot to mention that you are in a world of hurt if you lose the instructions too... very cryptic set of menus and functions.
Anyone looking at buying any of those dedicated chess machines should absolutely try to test drive one first.
As for the Excaliber line... several years ago I bought the Touch Chess - only after fooling around with it for a while I realized the pieces were very hard to distinguish and the display was problematic in regular light. A very bad piece of work. Almost forgot to mention that you are in a world of hurt if you lose the instructions too... very cryptic set of menus and functions.
Anyone looking at buying any of those dedicated chess machines should absolutely try to test drive one first.
Hi Kerry,
I agree...but I can tell you that generally speaking, you get what you pay for. The Maestro is actually a Mephisto product and the fact that it is back-lit makes a world of difference. At Strategy Games we will be getting a new order of these units in just in time for the Canadian Open.
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