Best chess computer

Hi all,

I want to get my self a chess computer for Christmas , I am new to the game and have been playing on the ipad and really enjoying it and find it helps me relax and reduces my stress and anxiety 

My anxiety is making it really hard to decide on one,as ifs causing me to over think and the decision it racing around my head .

I did start looking at the millennium chess genius pro for £140, but the more I play has made me look at better . Everyone has it pitfalls and youtube reviews feel sponsored . 

Please see below what I have looked at already, ideally I want to order via amazon .

Chess genius pro - unsure of the size and the press to move pieces,  plus lack of as adapter a d no networking for updates.  But it's the cheapest and can play standalone .

Vonsnet L6

Chinease brand I've not seen much off but like the lights and the fact it's not point and click, but I've seen reviews say it's easy to beat , plus not sure if any updates or online play. Worried the fact it has a built in battery means it has a set life span.

Square off pro - like and dislike the rolling on it, I can put it away from the kids , but will rolling and un rolling eventually break it. What happens if the app is not supported in future,  is the device dead ? Plus battery can't be replaced.  But looking at people playing it looks sooo smooth. Just with it being floppy kind of limits sofa play.

DgT centaur - love the look of this board but I can't find if the battery is user relpacable , plus doesn't look like any online play should I want it in the future.  Also does anyone know if it's magnetic ? I love the screen on this though as a big fan of eink

The king performance chess computer - love the look of it, no internal battery to worry about an di can make a power bank work. But not keen on the press to move . My big Question is, does this play normal chess, everyone seems to go on about this king game ?

Sorry for the long post, really hope someone can help convince my mind .

Stephen

I have several, here are my rankings based personal experiences
1. Chessnut Evo - currently the gold standard in my opinion
2. Chessup - solid board, geared more towards beginners but still solid overall
3. Chessnut Air - another solid piece of kit, was my number one before the Evo and Chessup entered the house
4. DGT Pegasus - decent but was a bit quirky in the past, not a bad one though
5. Millennium e-One - in my opinion more for studying with a laptop. Looks/feels more toyish that the others
6. SquareOff Pro - the worst of the bunch, lots of issues in the last with it (connectivity, reading pieces)
For YouTube, look for reviews by Katzenpapa, Al Su, and ChessNoob (all members here at chess.com).

[EDIT - had to fix some typos, I was posting from my phone on an airplane and, well, .... ]

@Stethorn I'm pretty sure your best bet for Christmas will be the L6 either from the Femuey or Vonset brand (they're the same). It was on sale for $160 just last week, but full price is $200 and usually priced at $180. If you do get the L6, you'll also want to get wooden replacement pieces which are slightly larger and more distinguishable than the plastic pieces that come with it ( see this link ). Both will be available from Amazon.

The L6 has magnetic sensors so you don't need to press to move. The 9-inch playable area makes for a portable game and yet not too small. It responds very fast and is very well lit for easy play. It's got an ELO rating around 2300, so I doubt you'll be able to beat it very easily. It does feel less like a computer and more like a human for some reason (the lower levels make blunders and imperfect moves). And I've found a hidden feature that allows you to vary the opening moves so that you're not playing the same opening too much (press the 'hint' button before you make your first move). The L6 cannot be used to play online OTB, but you can get a dedicated board for that later, and it'll be cheaper than the EVO (which you can't even buy right now at $600).

The Chessup is very similar to the L6 and may also be another option. It's a little bigger and able to play some online. But just know that the internal AI is kinda weak (ELO around 1100) and needs to be connected to another device to get better features. Online play also seems to have limitations.

The DGT Centaur is a slightly older board that also works well and is much larger. I believe it uses some sort of induction sensors, which makes it very easy to adapt your own wooden pieces if you want. I also like the lighting system for easy play. However, that board feels just a little sluggish in response.

I have the king performance and it feels like you are playing a person at the level it is on. It has a ton of options and I like it a lot. I highly recommend it. I think it might be one of the best Christmas gifts you ever got.

Second on @Yenster1's recommendation of the L6, and a definite second on buying the wood pieces like @Pawnerai did (or you can spend more money and time and make the pieces yourself the way Yenster1 did and I'm doing -- which in retrospect was a silly choice but I'm having fun so whatever).

Hi, I have the Millennium Chess Genius Pro 2024, so I can give you some details.
This computer uses Chess Genius, it is based on the first computer that won against Garry Kasparov in 1994: https://youtu.be/3EQA679DFRg

It is an "old style" computer chess - which is not necessarily a bad thing because the technology is simple and low power consumption. It is not connected online, only to use with built-in Chess Genius. It uses pressure sensor technology, a light press is required and it is smooth. It has magnetic chess pieces.

The max strength is around 2200 Elo, it has easier levels for beginners and club players. The playing style is pleasant at these levels, it does not make "artificial" blunders - except in "Fun levels".
The format is portable, it weights 550g, you can take it with you when you travel or if you want to play in a café.
A power supply can be used, but it is not necessary, a set of 4 AA/LR06 batteries would last for hours. I bought rechargeable LR06s, I have not recharged them yet.
2 small cons: there is no led lights on the boards, the moves are displayed on the small screen. Also, the coordinates are printed on each squares, which is unnecessary in my opinion.
The size:

Thanks for all the help, I've also come across the chessnut air which seems good, but needs a phone or tablet connection. I was trying to avoid this, but the more I think about it maybe its a good idea as can use different engines.

I agree entirely about SquareOff Pro. My biggest issue is that the board is too small for the pieces. It has 2-inch squares, which are way too small for the bases of the king, queen, and rook. The bases of the pieces are not uniform, with some bigger than others. It makes the game look crowded. Hold your breath when you move and hope it registers. If not, you'll play the rest of the game on your cellphone. And you can forget about playing bots at all.

The best chess computer (which I bought from The Great Britain - imagine that!, via "Ebay") is Mephisto's "Chess Challenger". It has secret menu in addition to regular, official menus from the manual. Important hint in addition to "secret menu" existence is that esspecially after playing in "fun levels" mode you should reset computer via "ACL" hole and extracting at least one batery and bringing back to make sure it will not have parameters left from the previous fun levels if played.

Inspite of pieces being plastic, their shape, weight and basis reminds of great master's 1930-ish and before times.

Digital retro-future look in conjuction with old chess sets vibe. Perfect.

P.S.: "Mephisto's" from 2004. "Chess Challenger", not to be confused with much older, legendary "Fidelity's" model with the same name...

I have also the Chessnut EVO. It is a nice chessboard with great potential but in my opinion it is not yet perfectly stable. For example, once in a while the moves are not recognized on the board. I understand that the team is working hard and software updates are released quite regularly, so I hope that it will improve with time.

I'm not happy with my DGT smart board. I'm considering a Chessnut Air and if I'm happy with the software, I might consider other Chessnut boards and custom pieces.

I have about 6 different custom NOJ sets with DGT sensors. Love the pieces... hating on DGT.

I love my DGT Smartboard in combination with the DGT Pi chess computer. Perfect for me. But it's a matter of taste. 😎

I've done some development on PicoChess as well. I''m mostly frustrated with the poor support on Mac. Have you played any chess.com bots using your DGT board yet?

Thank you for the detailed review, I am also thinking about this one. What I could not understand neither from the manual nor the youtube videos is how do you play this as black, considering coordinates are printed from white pov? Do you
(a) set the white pieces in front of you and play mirrored (bad idea) or
(b) set the black pieces above the display and controls and ignore the mislieading coordinates (pedagogocally wrong for beginners),
(c) set the pieces correctly relative to coordinates and turn the board upside down and rotate it at every move to see the opponents move (a horror), or
(d) will the computer invert at least the screen for you if not the controls so that you peek over the board for next move of the opponent or
(e) can you remove and rotate that mat so that h8 becomes on the lower left corner just above the display? (guess not because of the pressure sensitive electronics beneath it)

Sorry if this is obvious to everyone, all I have seen in the manual is play as white in the begenning, and then you can switch color and play "up the board" whatever that means...

Thanks in advance.

Hi, when you play Black, you just:
- set the black pieces above the display and controls and ignore the misleading coordinates
- the computer will invert invert the screen for you => so the screen have the right orientation

Thank you so much, ordered one. I might pimp it with double coordinates from black pov or hide these altogether, or something, we'll see after a number of games. Thank you for your opinion.

No, from my point of view it is not possible. But on Lichess you are able to play with your Mac and DGT board against bots. Runs fine for me.

I really like the bots on chess.com. I will check out the bots on lichens, thank you very much. This is very exciting.

Thank you @LoseMagnet, now that I played a few games against it, can I have two more questions?

One is about scoring, more precisely the plus minus in front of the number. It is not clear to me, but positive number does not seem to mean white's advantage and negative number black's advantage. Rather it seems to me scoring always from the computer point of view. Can you explain what say +0.5 and -0.5 mean in scoring?

My second question is about saved games, say I want to analyze them on lichess or here. What is the best way to extract a saved game and enter it elsewhere? To me it seems I have to manually jot down and manually enter it into the other tool.

Thank you for your help in advance.