Most "featureful" Palm Chess software?

[fncll]

I'm a patzer, so a couple of hundred ELO makes no difference to me... I am instead looking for the most "featureful" Palm OS chess program to aid me in playing, studying, setting up positions, etc. while on the road. Seems like this is the best bet when I don't want the bulk of a laptop, as it seems the Palm chess software is generally stronger than the portable dedicated units?

Thanks in advance...

[dvash]

Check out http://www.grailmaster.com/misc/chess/c ... eview.html for a very thorough review of PDA chess programs.

[WinPooh]

Try OpenChess. It's strong enough for amateur (you can play with Palm ports of Fruit or Scorpio, or with weaker GNUChess2 or embedded OpenChess engine). It supports setting up positions, storing games in Palm memory, etc. GUI provides fine picture and good usability. And it's FREE.

[rafowell]

I'm a patzer, so a couple of hundred ELO makes no difference to me... I am instead looking for the most "featureful" Palm OS chess program to aid me in playing, studying, setting up positions, etc. while on the road. Seems like this is the best bet when I don't want the bulk of a laptop, as it seems the Palm chess software is generally stronger than the portable dedicated units?

Thanks in advance...

The Palm programs are certainly stronger than the dedicated units.
The SSDF ratings listed at http://web.telia.com/~u85924109/ssdf/list.htm are

Code: Select all

                                        Rating   +     -   Games Won Av. opp
Hiarcs 9.5a/9.6 Palm TungstenE OMAP 126 2396	43	-42	274	54%	2370
Chess Genius 1.4 SX1 OMAP 310 120 MHz	2151	50	-48	210	60%	2081
Chess Tiger 14.9 Palm m515 16MB 42MHz	2103	69	-74	100	39%	2182

(Christophe has yet to release an ARM version of Chess Tiger - if he does, it should leapfrog Genius )

I'd say these three are the ones to choose from.
As far as which - they all have free download demos, so you could
simply try them out and choose the one you like best. I bought them all, myself, but I'm silly that way.

Mr Fishburn http://www.fishdev.net/chess/
prefers them in the order listed above (see his site for his comments),
and I think HIARCS likely has the most features of the lot, as well
as being unquestionably the strongest.

HIARCS is more expensive than Genius or Tiger, and the piece set does
not look quite as nice as that of Genius, if you have a modern
Palm with a hires display, but you have lots of controls, including
settable Elo, which is handy in having a sparring partner that is not
too depressing.

None of these supports recording/following variations and adding
comments, to my knowledge. For that you might want to try looking
at ChessPad ( http://www.solutionsinhand.com/ChessPad/ChessPad.htm ),
which does not play chess, but does support variations and annotatation).
If you go to http://www.chessreviews.com , and click on "reviews"
under "Navigation" at the top left, you will see a list of reviews, and can read the review of ChessPad.

So, your answer might be ChessPad plus one of the three below ...


HIARCS for Palm $43
http://www.hiarcs.com/palm_hiarcs.htm

Chess Genius for Palm $25
http://www.chessgenius.com/palm/index.html
Long review of Chess Genius here:
http://kantack.com/chess/chessgenius.htm

Chess Tiger for Palm $15
http://perso.orange.fr/ct_chess/
Review of Chess Tiger for Palm (long)
http://kantack.com/chess/chesstiger.htm

[rafowell]

Openchess for Palm is here: http://palmopenchess.sourceforge.net/

with a few more notes here:
http://sourceforge.net/project/shownote ... _id=482011

I'm a bit behind on this one - I have version 1.0,
and the current release is 3.0RC2 (which the site says is "not stable",
but hopefully, as a "release candidate",isn't too bad). My impression
is that it is definitely not the most "featureful" Palm chess software,
but as it is free, it is easy to try.

[tiger]

The correct link for Chess Tiger for PalmOS is:

http://www.chesstiger.com

Thank you for updating your bookmarks.


// Christophe

[WinPooh]

Openchess for Palm is here: http://palmopenchess.sourceforge.net/

with a few more notes here:
http://sourceforge.net/project/shownote ... _id=482011

I'm a bit behind on this one - I have version 1.0,

OpenChess made a HUGE jump since 1.0 to 3.0, both in interface and features.

and the current release is 3.0RC2 (which the site says is "not stable",
but hopefully, as a "release candidate",isn't too bad).

It is stable as a rock on my Palm TE2, Zire 71 and Sony Clie TJ25. It never crashes. Never.

My impression
is that it is definitely not the most "featureful" Palm chess software,
but as it is free, it is easy to try.

Again, a lot of features were added in 3.0, support for many engine-modules is the greatest one.

[WinPooh]

Don't forget Naum for Palm:
http://www.geocities.com/naum_chess/palm/index.html

It is not as strong as Hiarcs or even Fruit, it's graphics is not super, but it plays both normal chess and FRC, it has editable opening book and like OpenChess it's free.

[rafowell]

The correct link for Chess Tiger for PalmOS is:

http://www.chesstiger.com

Thank you for updating your bookmarks.


// Christophe

Ooops - sorry, Christophe. It was an accident: I knew better, and I have your site listed correctly as
http://www.chesstiger.com/ on the Palm Chess Software index I maintain at dmoz
(which has all the programs mentioned in this thread, and more).

http://dmoz.org/Games/Video_Games/Recre ... ld/PalmOS/

In this case, I clicked through to see if there was anything new on your site, then
copied and pasted the current working URL without thinking
about it rather than using the universal one.
Unfortunately, it seems this BBS does not let us correct posts after 15 minutes.

-Richard

[rafowell]

Vladimir - has these new chess sets for Open Chess been folded
back into the project?

http://smartpalmgames.com/palmchess.html

the author is offering them to the project, but made a fork
in the mean time.

-Richard