Novag Citrine thoughts

[CRoberson]

I'd like a board with a Robot arm or like the Phantom that also connects
to a PC. The board could play the PC and it would be great if the board
would follow a match between two PC engines.

[sje]

I'd like a board with a Robot arm or like the Phantom that also connects to a PC. The board could play the PC and it would be great if the board would follow a match between two PC engines.

I'd like to see that also. But I doubt that a fast, reliable, and durable robot arm can be had for under US$2,500.

I've thought about contacting one of the New England area universities that offers a robotics course and offering a grant of around US$2,500 for the construction of a quality chess robot arm. I figure the professor involved would pocket half of that, spend the other half on parts, and pay the grad students the usual nothing for their work.

[meschle]

Novag made a robot model before that was unreliable
http://www.chesscomputeruk.com/html/nov ... rsary.html

Good website btw with a great collection of chess computers.

For myself i would prefer a dgt board although citrine is tempting esp if cheaper secondhand

[sje]

What happens when a robotic chess computer wants to promote a pawn to a queen when its first queen is already on the board?

[Steve B]

What happens when a robotic chess computer wants to promote a pawn to a queen when its first queen is already on the board?

that depends on which Robot we are talking about
the Novag arm Robot would simply use the pawn as a queen
Fidelity and Milton Bradly provided little caps to put on the promoted pawn
Excalibur simply moved the promoted pawn as a Queen

Queen For-a-day Regards
Steve

[Steve B]

Novag made a robot model before that was unreliable

you got that right
i had THREE Novag Robot Adversary's and all three became defective after about 1-2 hours of play time
the motors in the arm just melt down
impossible to repair today..the parts simply are no longer available

having said that...
here is an auction for a defective Robot
people will bid on it and pay a good price...all in the false..misguided hope that they can have it repaired and then sell it for $4000-5000

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?Vi ... :IT&ih=015

they are throwing away their money regards
Steve

[sje]

that depends on which Robot we are talking about
the Novag arm Robot would simply use the pawn as a queen
Fidelity and Milton Bradly provided little caps to put on the promoted pawn
Excalibur simply moved the promoted pawn as a Queen

Queen For-a-day Regards
Steve

Sounds reasonable.

If you can remember that TV show, you must be as old as I am.

[Steve B]

If you can remember that TV show, you must be as old as I am.

Sadly i think my age is probably the sum total of the ages of three typical CCC members these days
52 Regards
Steve

[sje]

i had THREE Novag Robot Adversary's and all three became defective after about 1-2 hours of play time the motors in the arm just melt down
impossible to repair today..the parts simply are no longer available

I've heard of this problem too, and that's a big reason to take a pass on the new 2Robot model. At the very least, I'd think I'd wait a year or so.

In the 2Robot videos, one can see how the arm needs to re-home itself for position calibration after each action, That means at least two re-homings per move, and that means twice the wear vs a conventional robotic arm.

[Steve B]

I've heard of this problem too, and that's a big reason to take a pass on the new 2Robot model. At the very least, I'd think I'd wait a year or so.

here is an auction for another species of Chess Robot
the Excalibur Mirage
released about 10 years ago
also very poorly made with an extremely high defect rate
http://cgi.ebay.com/Excalibur-MIRAGE-Se ... 0291468282

strangely the Milton Bradly Robots which were released in the mid 1980's and the Fidelity Robots released in the early 90's were very well made and defect rates for these Robots were not high at all

just another example of how things are released today that are made with less quality care then things made 20 years ago

not just speaking of chess computers regards
Steve