Russell Sherwood Tuesday, August 27, 2024
My grandfather was known throughout the small village of Port Dinorwic (now Y Felinheli) as Dafydd Engine Bach. He used to drive a small steam engine on a narrow-gauge railway at this once busy slate exporting site , between Bangor, where I was born, and Caernarfon . The railway closed in 1961.
I drive a car, not very often. The engine I use and rely on daily is my chess software . I've been using for some time a Komodo14 DVD, on a Stockfish 10 setting, after learning from Russell that it had a choice of settings. Until recently I was happy with this. My losses have usually been my own careless errors. Perhaps, I should have picked up earlier that Stockfish 10 is not wholly reliable .
This has been driven home to me in a current game. Stockfish 10 informed me on a depth of 62 that I had a decisive advantage of 2.67 as Black. My excitement was punctured when I read that Stockfish 16.1 evaluates the position at a depth of 46 as 0.00. The penny rudely dropped that my software is not fit for purpose and it was time to replace it. 'Why not just run Stockfish 16, which is free? Or one of the CC-oriented derivatives such as Brainlearn?', my team captain helpfully suggested.
I did give this some thought and watched You Tube video instruction on how to download Stockfish 16. I didn't though follow this journey through. At some point in listening to the instruction of downloading the Stockfish zipfile, installing the Arena Chess GUI , I began to doubt my ability to apply this and manage the files, folders and my computer.
At the cost of £80, I felt that I still needed the reassurance of using software in DVD form. My Komodo 14 with Stockfish 10 have been consigned to the dustbin, replaced by Fritz19, the ICGA World Champion Engine, 2023. In time, as new engines develop and supersede this, I can see myself chugging along in correspondence chess , in my grandfather's footsteps, as Dafydd Engine Bach
Phil Morgan
CorrespondenceChessICCFSoftwareWCCF
