Best iphone chess app?

I totally get that.  I still have wistful moments where I long for my Novag Sapphire.  (And truth be told - 80% of the chess I play against AI is on my Obsidian.. can't beat real wooden pieces!!)  I've got Hiarcs 12.1 Palm as well, and I too was a bit "what the!" when I first got my hands on the iPhone version.  No support for variations?!  Etc.  The Palm version of Hiarcs may well still be the best computer chess you can hold in your... uh.. palm.  Aesthetics aside, of course.  :)

I'm still holding out hope that iPhone chess will continue to mature, and things will continue moving along in the right direction.  Last year saw a lot of change in the field, after all.

I haven't had issues with battery life yet, but I must admit, I got one of those Mophie juice-pak cases (with the auxiliary battery).  The thing is a life-saver.

Vintage :D but in a positive sense. Was it "strong enough" (I have never had any "standalone/portable chess computer" before I got a cellphone with a chess app on it)? I believe it was, was it comparable to a chess app on an "old" Palm?

I hope I will get my Palm m515 before end of the week, also I've found a discount coupon for HIARCS in my iPhone version, so all in all - after I buy HIARCS for Palm - I will get iPhone one for free... :)

But I will start with demo versions of HIARCS and ChessGenius.

Considering the chip in the Sapphire was built to provide a brain for a dishwashing machine, it played a *plenty* ruthless game, as I remember...  I never managed to beat it without using handicap settings.  Its playing style was very similar to that my Obsidian now uses against me.  Novag is kind of a strange company; their marketing and user documentation is full of errors and misinformation.  But I like their stuff.

The Sapphire had no graphical board at all.  It came with a magnetic analysis-style set (which fit into a nice padded leatherette case along with the computer), but of course you could play on any board you liked.

As much as I love that my phone/alarm-clock/mobile-browser can whup me at chess while I'm listening to my favourite play-list, I'll probably always have a soft spot for quirky dedicated devices.  :)

But it is software, that is a heart of such a chess computer. See HIARCS "pwning" majority of players on old, monochrome, 16MHz Palm machines :) and that's why I don't care that Palm I have just bought has 22MHz or so.

Considering parameters specified on provided site (32 KB ROM, 1 KB RAM), there should literally be no space for decent openings book... however I have seen once chess computer which main feature was that it "knew" 10 openings (less than 200 moves) :) so if you have some fun playig it, it means it must be really well programmed.

Because those are DEDICATED :) their main and only reason is to play chess, not to make you some coffe while watering your garden, posting your achievements on facebook and somwhere between the lines playing chess ;)

Also those are (the stronger ones) great examples how much you can achieve with "a chip for dishwasher" if only you try hard and optimize it here and polish there ;)

AND they just don't run battery out just after hour or two just because they were displaying opengl chess board while you were thinking (and probably using some real, wooden chess set)...

My Palm has arrived. Quick comparison:

HIARCS

Chess Genius

... and now I will have to buy HIARCS. Demo version is very restrictive...

The iPhone versions are way more attractive...

I do know they are far more attractive and possibly stronger (for example HIARCS rates itself 1933 on my Palm and 2650 on my iPhone). But while Chess Genius has the same feel on all platforms (I've seen/play it so far on Nokia E50, iPhone 2G and Palm m515), HIARCS for Palm and iPhone are two different apps. iPhone one is "just another chess app" with well known name (and awful icon), while Palm one is the best portable chess program.

So I'll stick to Chess Genius on iPhone, but I'm intending to buy HIARCS for Palm ASAP.

I have the paid version of HIARCS on my iPhone and it's really good... got nice battles out of it and I'm currently rated around 1950, so I usually set up the machine to play at around 2100...

shredder was updated:

What's new

- Enjoy the power of the new Shredder 12 engine
- Faster and more accurate analysis mode
- Learn the name of the opening you are playing
- Email games without leaving Shredder (one or all games)
- The strongest chess engine for the iPhone
- Further improvements in graphics, performance, and battery life

Sweet..  Thanks for the heads-up, KHRoN.

Our program iGrandMaster can load, save and mail PNGs. You can import PNGs from other Websites, if you have an URL. Currently it is limited to PNGs that contain only one game.

You can find out more at http://www.igrandmaster.de/

Shredder Light for free and Shredder discounted to $4.99 for christmas

Oooh, full version for 5 bucks is a pretty sweet deal. 

Great new update for tChess Pro today...

I just downloaded the new version - available now in the App Store.  Here's what's new:

- New "Database" feature: download and view PGN files!!

- Replaced the computer's difficulty levels with ratings:  play against any Elo rating from 500 to 2500

- Replaced the Statistics feature with new "Profile" feature: play against the computer for rating points, and track your progress with the rating history feature

The new stuff looks fantastic (although I guess I'll never achieve my goal of beating Level 8 now...). 

Most vital I guess is the database feature, adding a capability that until now was exclusive to Chess Genius (which hasn't seen an update in some time now).  You can upload PGN from an entered Internet address, and the game includes a small Bobby Fischer database file for you to try out.  You can view the PGN before loading it into the game screen as well.  If you want to look at other games, there are already bookmarks to a "Gary Kasparov collection" and a "World Championship 2008" file (hosted on tchess.com) as well.  Nice!

I like the new ratings and profile-related feature as well.

The one drawback I can see so far:  the Resign and Offer Draw options (which were formerly very well hidden in the Statistics section of all places) now seem to have disappeared entirely.  Maybe they'll make a come-back sometime soon.  All in all, this seems like a small price to pay for all the new goodies.  :-)

EDIT:  I spoke too soon, btw.  Resign and Offer Draw are still there - even more visible than before - but they appear only in the context of rated games (which are the only games to affect your profile stats).  Works for me.

Magnus's Online Chess has just updated to 2.0.1

Check out the website here if you haven't already:
http://www.onlinechessapp.com/

Hi all , i'd like to invite everyone here :  www.chess-iphone.blogspot.com The page is still in progress and have many bugs but you find 66 chess programs for Iphone like nowhere.  I made this site just in two days and like i said there's many bugs so please help me if you find something wrong - send mail or post here...thx.  (btw sorry 4 my english).

interesting offer:

A MacBook Pro 13-inch 2.26GHz, if you are the first player to achieve 2,500 Elo

Or an iPod touch 32GB, if you are one of the first 2 players to achieve 2,400 Elo

Or an iPod touch 16GB, if you are one of the first 3 players to achieve 2,300 Elo

Or an iPod Nano 8GB, if you are the first player to achieve 2,200 Elo

Or an iPod Shuffle 2GB, if you are the first player to achieve 2,100 Elo

http://forums.toucharcade.com/showthread.php?t=41478

Are there any chess apps out there that allow variations within a PGN file?

I want to load my opening repertoires on my iphone so I can learn them. I figure the best way to do this is to create a PGN with all the variations and then load it into a chess app that will support the multiple variations.

Alternatively is there any chess app that support learning your own customized openings?

The answer to your first question (re: support for variants) is still, so far, no.  :(

Not sure what you mean by 'customized openings,' without going back to the lack of support for variants (?).