CHESS SOFTWARE...which one?

I am just coming back to chess after a few decades. I have a new desk top computer but running WIN 7 which I like.  

Would like to purchase a chess software program. Yes I Know any of them will beat me to a pulp but I want a good chess program with many options.  

I am looking at Chess King 4 with Hudini 4 which is on eBay ($49.95) and Amazon ($59.97)  both at a resonable price. It looks up to date and seems to be the latest. Also this company (Chess Queen/Chess King puts out many traning videos which I was hoping would be built into the orginal software but maybe hoping for too much.

Is this about the best I can buy for my $$$ and are their training videos very good?  Was rated 1446 30 years ago and probably much weaker now.  I do enjoy the game and chess collecting of old chess literature. 

First, maybe i need to ask you whether you intend to play profesionally or just keep chess as a decent hobby? (But i assume you just play it as a hobby since you took a break for 30 years :) ). If you treat chess as a hobby, i think you still can get benefit from open source program such as Lucas Chess Program, and you can download some early version of popular first class software such as early version of houdini or rybka and integrate that into your Lucas Chess software. Google will help a lot for this purpose :). For someone rated below 2000, i think the early version of those programs are very worthy, and moreover those are free. :)

And once again, if you are rated below 2000, sometimes very strong software can bring frustration more than enlightment, since we still need to work hard to sharpen some of fundamental skill.

Thanks for the reply, I thought a ton of people would chime in on this question but I guess not.  

Yes took off about 40 years, raised a family, worked many hours and now semi-retired. I was always more of a chess collector of books vs. playing but now am intriqued if I can reach a master rating before I leave this world. 63 at present.  

Maybe you can tell me what the difference is between Chess King and Houdini?  Is Houdini the analysis where Chess King is the engine?

I don't mind spending the $50 I can get Chess King 4 with Houdini 4 since someone put lots of hard work into it. I guess I need to know whether alone will it improve my game. Do the modules for opening/tatics & strategy/endgame come with it, all in one?   I didn't want to buy something that I have to buy modules for to improve. 

As someone who hasn't bought CK (and only studied the CK web site), I'll throw in my quick 2 cents. (I can't opine on the videos, though.) It seems to be a good value for someone who doesn't do a lot of customization in a chess GUI. It appears there's quite a bit you can do with CK, but you're usually forced to do something only one way, the CK way. What I'm trying to say is that many of the special functions of CK are hooked into the Houdini engine, so performing any of these functions forces you to use the Houdini engine and only the Houdini engine. I'm not sure exactly how difficult it would be to substitute a different engine, and I'm not sure what special functions would break if you did substitute another engine.

The bottom line is that as long as you're happy always using the supplied Houdini engine, and as long as you don't tire of the puke froggy green color of the GUI (color non-adjustable AFAIK), then you might be happy with it.

I have ChessKing and it's a lot of fun to use.  Comes with an OK database as well although the search functions aren't as robust or intuitive as some.  I use CK mostly for the drills; there must be over a thousand chess problems and while the beginning ones are designed to teach the rudiments of the game, they become more challenging and help to build the all important "pattern recognition".  You are limited to Houdini however and for those who like to switch engines in and out, that could be a deal breaker.  You also learn to play against the computer in a series of challenges where Houdini is playing full strength but down material.  These range from the embarassingly easy to not so. Again, a lot of fun, and teaches you how to put a game away up material against a near perfect opponent.

I'd check out HIARCS though if you want a more realistic opponent.  You can also play against it from any of about 200 standard openings at either full or dumbed down to your level strength.  Great search parameters for databases also.

And of course Fritz.  Pain in the butt nonintuitive interface but very powerful, easy to switch engines in and out, and pretty easy to use analysis.  There is also an artificial opponent who insults you if you like that sort of thing.

They're all good, relatively cheap, and kind of balance each other's strengths.  Good luck choosing one; I obviously couldn't. 

Missed this question of yours in my post:

Do the modules for opening/tatics & strategy/endgame come with it, all in one?   I didn't want to buy something that I have to buy modules for to improve. 

Those are actually stand alone modules that don't require Chess King but offer thousands more problems.  Serious Russian School training in digital form so you'd better be serious for anything but the level 1 tactics.  As you can tell, I'd like to be a serious student,  but I'm really not.  Good training if you want to put the work in though.

I do like Steve Lopez's 3 video series on openings a lot.  It's designed for beginning intermediates and gives you just enough information about each opening to make an informed decision about using it.  I do have a lot of "stuff" from ChessKing, don't I ?  

Ebay is your friend if you want anything from ChessKing.  Sure you have to bid on the stuff, but believe me, most of the time you're the only bidder and you'll save about 20%.  Think I'm done...

I recently taught a seminar on using chess software. For learning purposes, Chess.com Diamond membership is best for you, wiscmike.

Software like Chess King offers nothing to what's available on Chess.com.

The main purpose of having chess software is to help you analyze your games. Storing games, organizing opening repertoire, etc., can also be done using mainstream software.

But Chess King is not the way to go. For that, you can instead download the free ChessBase Reader (google it) and then install the free Stockfish 5 chess engine.

If you were to purchase chess software, I would recommend Fritz but honestly, there's no need to purchase one.

Chess King/Queen products are unnecessary.

I use Chessbase Reader which is free, and use the Stockfish engine to analyze my games.I also have a couple of Everyman chessbooks that can can be opened by Chessbase reader, along with one Chessbase DVD.

Chessbase Reader: http://en.chessbase.com/pages/download

Stockfish: http://stockfishchess.org/

This being said, I'm sure any chess engine rated what, 2600 or higher (I think Chessbase Reader comes with a Fritz chess engine) is more than enough to get you started.

Getting a upgraded membership on chess.com I did find to be very useful. I didn't go for Diamond because I know I'm not able to play/read/practice chess all the time.

The chess software you *could* buy would be something like Chess Position Trainer 5 (which I list because there is nothing free that offers what it offers).  Other software you could buy is nearly useless because there is free software out there that does what it does.

Chessbase?  Scid vs. PC does pretty much everything useful that Chessbase does and is completely free.  People want Chessbase because they see all the pros using it.  Don't bother.  You can get Stockfish 5 and use it inside of Scid vs. PC and have the strongest chess engine in the world and very capable database and analysis software.

Fritz? Get Lucas Chess.  Tons of modes to play against the computer and train your abilities.

As far as paying for chess.com, the decider there will be whether you think Chess Mentor is worth it.  Try out the demo.  If you don't think that is worth the price, don't bother with a chess.com membership.  Instead, I would spend the money on a chesslecture.com membership for video content if you want that sort of thing.  Beyond that, the instructional content you want is probably better off obtained through books.

Chesstempo.com is excellent for practicing tactics and calculation, and it's completely free (though paying for that service is not out of the question, as the premium side offers some useful tools).

If you have any specific questions, I'm happy to answer.

Oh, and to answer an earlier question of yours, Chess King is the GUI (and by all accounts it is inferior to Fritz/Chessbase GUI) and Houdini is the engine (and it is slightly inferior to Stockfish, which is free, though not enough inferior for that to be a deciding factor, really).

Basically, don't dare pay for the engine, since the strongest engine in the world is the free and open source Stockfish 5.  If you want to pay for a GUI or training software, I would recommend Chessbase/Fritz, though I feel they are totally unnecessary since Scid vs. PC and Lucas Chess exist and are excellent (I actually prefer them).

can't get stockfish to install, I downloaded it and do not see an exe file. also I am on the page to download Scid vs PC and will download the win 64 version but still don't understand why you need to download both a database and an engine and how do you coordinate the two to work together?  

1) the exe file is in the /windows sub-folder from the stockfish package you downloaded.  You don't need to run it, you will need to point your GUI to that exe file, so make sure you know where you put it.

2) You don't need to download both the database program and the engine, since Scid vs. PC comes with an engine, but Stockfish is a lot better than the one that comes with it.

3) When you run Scid vs. PC, go to Tools-Analysis Engines, and click new. From there, type Stockfish as the name, and click browse beside "Command."  This is where you will browse to the correct stockfish exe file mentioned earlier.  You can just leave everything else as is and click ok.  Stockfish will then be ready to use.  You can start an analysis engine at any time by clicking on the little train icon.

If you want a good database of a bunch of games to use with Scid vs. PC, go to http://gorgonian.weebly.com, click on downloads, PGN/Other and there is a download of TWIC1-1026 (The Week in Chess game files 1 through 1026) in SCID format which you can download and then open from within SCID.

wiscmike, you seem to be confused regarding some chess terms. A chess database is a collection of chess games played. An engine performs the actual analysis. The graphic user interface (GUI) is the main piece of software which you can use to input your games for analysis, create PGN files, etc.

Chessbase Reader is GUI. Houdini, Stockfish, Komodo, etc. are names of engines.

Fritz is the name of an engine and GUI. Fritz GUI is good but engine is weak. Best is to use Fritz or the free ChessBase Reader along with Stockfish 5.

My windows folder is empty for stockfish. I am going to give up tonight as I just don't seem to get it. 

Maybe...what program do I download first..I have Win 7 64 bit

What do I download 2nd....and how do I connect the two or don't I?

I used to have a super old version of Fritz when it came out and it seemed to do it all, maybe it was the database and enh=gine all in one I guess.

I will check this thread as I will be up playing poker which right now seems so much easier than this although NL is a tough game.

Can you give me the links I need, I am on the Scid vs PC page to download the  Win 64 file but after I download it I have no idea what to do with it. If you feel CB is much better is the link that was given earlier the best link to download?

Okay I see stockfish is a zip file and I now unzipped it. Horay the first step I think. I will now download Chessbase Reader. 

http://www.chess.com/article/view/chesscom-university-seminar-using-fritz-and-chessbase-reader-to-analyze-games-and-create-pgn-files

Installed Chessbase reader a sucess.  I opened it after I installed it and see it has 2 engines attached already Fritz 11 SE and Fritz 960. Now how do I attach the stockfish that I just unzipped.  Under home I do see engine management but can not see how to attach stockfish to it.

Thanks for the link, I almost have it now without signing up for the $10 seminar. I installed stockfish inside CB reader and now it shows active but also the two Fritz engines also show active so I guess I just double click on the Fritz engines and deactive them both and use stockfish 5.  

Thank you all for the help and my almost undertanding the CB from the engines. 

I may also pony up for a premium membership on here if need be as this site is not free since everything has a cost in this world.  In fact I will it's just the level I don't know about.