I have older versions of Chessbase and Fritz but find them hard to use and buggy. Are there open source alternatives to Chessbase and Fritz and where can I get them? I would like to use Crafty to analyze my games for example.
Crafty plus Arena would make a good analysis tool. Scid is an open source alternative to Chessbase. Stick Arena and Scid into Google and you will find them.
Scid for database
Arena for interface
Any UCI engine to play (Toga and Loop are among the strongest and are stronger than Fritz)
This site has many open source UCI engines...but the site is in French!?
http://pagesperso-orange.fr/lefouduroi/tournois/uci/uel.htm
You can still navigate it and figure out what engine you like though.
Crafty?? Why would anyone use Crafty? 
It sucks compared to other engines, really...
http://www.rybkachess.com/free/Rybka22n2.zip
Rybka 2.2, from the Rybka series which has been World Computer Chess Champion for ages, is free for download there and stronger than any grandmaster in the world. Crafty however would lose to most of the top 100 players in the world.
Hello everyone, I'd like to reopen this discussion.
About Scid, there is a currently fork for it, Scid vs. PC, does anyone knows which one is better? Does anyone know another one?
Thanks
SCID vs. PC is better, and more actively updated. There are a couple of other forks of the SCID project, too (ChessDB, mainly). I wouldn't bother with anything but SCID vs. PC. It is great, and I actually prefer it to Chessbase, myself.
Scid 4.4 has just been released.
http://scid.sourceforge.net/index.html
A new beta of ScidvsPC is online, so I guess a new version isn't far away. Seems the window docking feature is being coded for ScidvsPC.
http://scidvspc.sourceforge.net/index.html
IM pfren recommended SCID to me, even though he knows I already have ChessBase 9. From what I read in several online articles SCID vs PC appears to be highly recommended
http://freecode.com/projects/scid-vs-pc
http://www.edcollins.com/chess/scidvspc/what-is-scid-vs-pc.htm
Type scid vs pc in a search engine for more info and reviews
Next time it might be better to just start a new thread, I may not be the only hasty reader who didn't notice your current question is not just a rehash of the first one - or that the original posts were 5 yrs old!
chess position trainer (cpt), lucaschess, chess hero, and perhaps chessx are interesting free downloads too. SCID and Arena suffice though if you are interested in freeware.
I use CB2009 premium [building/managing dbs] and CPT [memorizing dbs - although I don't do/use this as much I should as I play highly theoretical lines not too well prepared even for my level] and bought the licenses for both ($67 and $30 respectively they were at the time). gr8 and stable products, although i am reasonably technology savvy anyway - i found them the most user friendly and aesthetic for what i wanted to do for building a repertoire.
How do you open .cbh files in Scid Vs.?
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I have older versions of Chessbase and Fritz but find them hard to use and buggy. Are there open source alternatives to Chessbase and Fritz and where can I get them? I would like to use Crafty to analyze my games for example.