need help choosing smart board

Hi I hope you are all well. Thanks in advance for your help.

I am looking for an electronic chess board for my son who is a beginner. He will have books to read on the subject as well,

I would like one that it is possible to connect to chess.com or similar and play online, can also be used offline, can give some kind of teaching help, and that can visually indicate moves on the board. My son has a bluetooth enabled windows pc and an android smart phone for connectivity. I'd prefer a larger board, say 2" square size and reasonably sized peices, 3.5" king or more.

So I have been looking around at ChessUp, Square off pro, DGT pegasus, chessnut pro.

I really like the epaper of the pegasus, perfer it to the corner led's but ive read that the board is very very difficult to beat at any stage.

I also like the full square light up of the chessup , which also shows which moves are bad / good / better / best, but it looks a bit plasticky and small.

if the board is £500 or less I am happy, Which would you choose, and am I missing anything from the list?

thanks again.

I would recommend nothing less than a DGT e-board, if your budget permits.

Pros:

- fully wooden board and pieces.

- It is the de facto standard in tournaments, so if your son progresses and very much likes the game, he will be very happy to study at home and play on the board which is actually used in the pro tournaments

- It is large in size, actually the official FIDE tournament size

- It gets engines, power and features from the program it connects to (I mean to a PC, Android or Mac). So it will never be obsolete. Depending on the engine and program you connect it to, it can play as a zero-ELO beginner or as an approx. 4000 ELO super-world-champion.

- It doesn't have LEDs nor display on the board. The "real" and serious boards do not have one..

- Via proper programs it connects to Lichess server, to play online.

At the end I think it depends on what direction you want to steer, or you believe/hope your son would steer.

Serious player or very much fan/interested in "real" chess games? --> DGT.

Anything that is more close to the toy side of it? --> Anything else.

Hope this helps; this is of course just my humble opinion.

I suggest the Chessnut Pro. All wood, hidden LEDs, large size, fast, individual piece recognition (like DGT), 10h battery, compatibility with lichess and chessy.com, good and reactive team. The only downsides : - not weighted pieces (need to add 200$) - no indicators on possible moves, tips... it only shows the opponent moves.

square off pro or SWAP

thanks for all the advice so far...

I agree with Agatti1970 about going with DGT with one difference. I would suggest the DGT smartboard over the DGT eboard. Reasons are: its significantly cheaper and it's much lighter than the regular eboard so easier. The lighter eboard allows you to take it with you to friendly meet ups in parks or homes of friends. It also makes it easier to store and take back down from your book shelves between games or study sessions.

You can take the money you save and buy some nice wood dgt enabled pieces.

hi everyone, thanks again.

I'm going for the square off pro.

thanks for all your help!

I agree with Agatti1970 and KineticPawn. I use my DGT Smartboard with Lichess, Linux (Arena), Windows (Fritz18, Chessbase17). The technology is a bit older, but in my eyes more mature. Everything runs smoothly for me. Soon I will buy a DGT Pi. 
Contrary to Agatti1970, I have deliberately chosen the plastic pieces, because they are better in my hand. But I must admit that a real wooden board and figures looks a little bit better. 😎 But that's all a matter of taste.

I have read only positive reviews about DGT Pi so far. Can you confirm this or are there serious disadvantages. Thank you very much.

@kevineaton77

In your case, I strongly suggest the ChessUp board as the best option.

P.S. The Pegasus does not have any e-ink, the Centaur does.

Hi ChessElk, in my opinion the solution I found - that is to use Acid Ape chess - is superior to DGTPi on all aspects. At the end, as usually happens, it is down to what you're looking for, but honestly I can't find an area where the DGT-Pi is superior to AAC. Or better, one exists, and I'll speak about that in a moment.

The DGTPi is basically a standalone box. You connect it to the board, and use it to play against the built-in engines, or to analyse games (to some basic extent). The problems with that are threefold.

1- DGTPi is an old box, for which DGT has discontinued producing updates. This means that, once you buy it brand-new today, you'll find that the built-in engines are rather old. I think Stockfish 7 or 9, I can't remember very well. Other built-in engines are old as well.

2- You can't connect the DGT-Pi online. This means that you must really consider your DGT board connected to the DGT-Pi as a "local" thing. This could still be ok if you don't like online play.

3- The DGT-Pi has a one-line screen, being 11 chars long. This means that whatever info, menu, option, engine evaluation, setup, etc. etc. will be displayed on a one-line LCD display, requiring you to press the buttons (up, down, left, right) a million times to get to the option, text, menu, you need. Annoying to say the least. I prefer using my memory for the opening lines, rather than to remeber the key sequence to find that damned option I needed.

I mentioned there is one aspect that makes the DGT-Pi still interesting (for some people). It is the fact that you can - if you're up to - enjoy the fact that an active Google Group exists of competent people, who creates new updates for the DGT-Pi, to let you play the latest engines on it, despite DGT does not provide such official updates.

Installing the updates on the DGT-Pi is not really a piece of cake, but those of us having experience with Linux and optionally with Python, could find it interesting.

I have not mentioned the many reasons why I found AAC so much superior to the DGT-Pi, but I can do so if there is interest. I just wanted to reply to your specific question.

Hope this helps

AG

Hello @agatti1970,
thank you very much for your detailed and competent answer to my question. 👍👍👍
It meets exactly what I expect from the DGT-Pi. I just want to play with the box offline without connecting the PC.
I am very familiar with LINUX and the Raspberry Pi. I have been using Python in the professional field for many years.
About AAC: That would have been my first choice too, but I don't have a single Android device anymore. And a USB DGT board with APPLE iOS doesn't work, unfortunately.
But your explanations got me thinking. Maybe a cheap Android tablet has a similar price as a DGT Pi.
Otherwise my DGT board runs without problems with Lichess, Fritz, Chessbase and Arena.

This sounds like a job for the Millennium chess computer. The six year old kid that beat me last year had a tablet. He had, I think, a USCF program on his tablet that he used to record his moves and had me sign his tablet after the game.

https://www.chesshouse.com/collections/millennium-chess-computers/products/millennium-chess-computer-the-king-performance

Hi @ChessElk, you're welcome.

Based on your competence and proficiency in Linux and Python, you certainly won't have issues with updating your DGT-Pi to the latest release, and will also be able to potentially "transform" your DGT-Pi into a PicoChessWeb machine, which is basically a Raspberry Pi 4 (actually Pi 3b, given the one that's inside the DGT-Pi) with a 7" color display. This would make the DGT-Pi much more usable than its current incarnation, and very appealing. You may want to have a look at resources like: https://groups.google.com/g/picochess which is the page of the Google Group dedicated to PicoChess; You can contact @Hamilton53 here on chess.com which is an active user of the PicoChessWeb machine and a frequent flyer of such Google Group; https://www.schachcomputer.info/forum/showthread.php?t=6378&page=5 a somehow old thread, which is still interesting since it gives you an idea of the housing you need (and how it will look like!) once you transform your DGT-Pi into a PicoChessWeb machine.

To be honest, if I hadn't had AAC, I would have purchased a Pi-4b and built my own PicoChessWeb myself.

On the other hand, it would be fantastic if you could put your hands on an Android device and test AAC with it. You're not forced to use AAC online. It works great also as a standalone unit. In case you want to use it on a Tablet, I recommend contacting the developer. I've experience of AAC with smartphones, but I never used it myself on a tablet.

Whatever the choice, it will be a great experience after all. a DGT board gifts the players with a very satisfying playing pleasure.

Enjoy, and have a great day.

Andrea.

Hello @agatti1970,
thank you very much for the tip. Now I have a lot to read 😀♟️
Have a great day, too

CE

yep same

Have had the chessnut pro with the premium pieces for 2 weeks and I am very impressed. Recognition is flawless and the speed is very fast. The only downside is that I cant really play speed chess as I am losing time moving opponents pieces. I have settled into playing 15/10 and will try longer time controls as I wanted to get away from the speed chess on the screen and back to more classical over the board feel. For this purpose, the board is excellent.