English Chess Forum

Has anyone tried any new chess software recently?

I have been trying Free chess 2.1 and found that it is simple to use and play.

i currently have Fritz 14, Chessmaster 10 and mephisto master chess computer board, but i dont often use them (very rarely).

Obviously personal preferences are key but for me I find:

1. chess.com is best for correspondence tournaments
2. lichess is best for playing against others and for its studies (latter particularly good when used by our team captain in conjunction with Zoom to review all our 4NCL online games once the last game has finished)
3. Chessable for inputting and learning openings (using their spaced repetition method - this requires premium I think)
4. Chess tempo for tactics (I make custom sets and use the 'Woodpecker' method. Again, this may require premium)
5. Arena Chess (free) for playing against the computer and for playing engine vs engine tournaments in off beat openings to create a database of games to study)
6.. Chessbase (or SCID vsPC which is free) for exploring openings with a very large database
7. CCRL Chess for downloading massive amounts of high quality engine games to add to databases

8. RChess (https://rchess.de) for creating, maintaining and using opening repertoires. Its for free, but no open source. Runs everywhere where Java is available.

I am seriously underusing chess software and don't even understand some of the jargon mentioned above. I have Fritz 15 and don't use it much more than to run through my recently played games, though I actually know how to post games on here. I know how to prepare for opponents using ChessBase but again use only a small percentage of its capability. It's an age thing of course but perhaps old dogs can learn a few new tricks.

I think there would be a market opportunity for a coach to run chess software sessions, say in the evening at a congress like the British. It would need to be a smallish group required to bring their own laptops. I have to be taken through stuff click by click rather than watch a lecture.

Paul Habershon wrote: ↑

Fri Jan 24, 2025 3:58 pm

I am seriously underusing chess software and don't even understand some of the jargon mentioned above. I have Fritz 15 and don't use it much more than to run through my recently played games, though I actually know how to post games on here. I know how to prepare for opponents using ChessBase but again use only a small percentage of its capability. It's an age thing of course but perhaps old dogs can learn a few new tricks.

I think there would be a market opportunity for a coach to run chess software sessions, say in the evening at a congress like the British. It would need to be a smallish group required to bring their own laptops. I have to be taken through stuff click by click rather than watch a lecture.

As far as I know that does occur in online sessions given by coaches? I would imagine they are easily enough found. There are many coaches on chess.com to choose from.

On https://rchess.de you can find a chess database program dedicated to repertoire management, running on Linux, Unix and Windows. A 100 page handbook and a sample database is included and a paper about repertoire management. Demos are also available in German and English.

Lucas chess is the one I use. Lots to it.

https://lucaschess.pythonanywhere.com/