Does anyone know where to get a good engine and some software to analyze stuff in a user-friendly fashion?
I always assumed I could do this with crafty and winboard. Well, I can't. I just tried, for the first time, in a difficult endgame position. I plugged the position into winboard, told it to play crafty against itself, and watched as my ram got used up and all my processor cycles went kaput, and I eventually had to control-alt-delete it to death.
So obviously THAT doesn't work. I also have der bringer, but I can't figure out how to get it to open pgn or fen... this is gettingly highly annoying.
Any bright ideas anyone? Or do I just need a more powerful computer to get any engine to play rook 'n pawn endgames without crashing?
Paul, I asked the same question here a little while ago, and didn't get much by way of response. I have not yet found a freeware or shareware program with a user-friendly analysis system like that in, say, the recent versions of Chessmaster. If you find one I'd love to hear about it.
Actually, it seems to me that there's a startling dearth of smooth, high-quality freeware and shareware chess games on the PC for people who don't want to use an engine and winboard. Most of the games I've found seem either pretty limited or a bit patchy and non-user friendly.