Help with engine settings | Forums

[EMC2004]

Hello everyone!
I need an help in configuring Chessmaster X engine properly, particularly I would know how I can improve computer strength by setting game engine.
I did some experiment but it said that changing default values could even decrease computer strength, so I want avoiding mistakes!
Can simultaneously active programs (such as antiviruses and so on) affect engine strength?
I anticipately thank everyone who can help me!

[EMC2004]

Hello everyone!
I need an help in configuring Chessmaster X engine properly, particularly I would know how I can improve computer strength by setting game engine.
I did some experiment but it said that changing default values could even decrease computer strength, so I want avoiding mistakes!
Can simultaneously active programs (such as antiviruses and so on) affect engine strength?
I anticipately thank everyone who can help me!

[c1arinetboy]

By changing the settings like attacker/defender you can only change the playing style, not the overall strength. However, if you go to Preferences/Engine... you can give the engine higher priority, transposition table size, and blunder alert priority. I would think changing these could make the engine work faster. Also, you might press ctrl-alt-delete to bring up the task manager, go to processes, and right-click on the chessmaster processes to raise their priority in Windows. Keep in mind I have never actually tried any of these things, but they should work in theory.

[Jason2004s]

I am very happy that CMX allows for adjustment to how much of a computer's resources can be used.

In the Engine Settings the default settings seem fairly low for today's computer standards, (only 2MB of ram for transpotition table memory.)

I have been making adjustments to these settings and have 2 questions:

1) When I make adjustments to Engine Priority, I don't see too much difference, even going from lowest to highest. When looking in my Task Manager, it shows only 13% of my CPU being used for it regardless of the Priority setting. (Additionally, when viewing the Mentor Lines, it takes an equal amount of time to reach equal depth levels of a given position, regardless of where the Engine Priority is set.) Are the two unrelated? Does increasing the Engine Priority actually increase the Mentor's strength? (or the strength of TheKing.exe?)

2) Changing the memory available for transposition DOES have an impact on the Mentor lines, as more ram available increases its thinking speed. However, in the Task Manager, the maximum amount of ram TheKing.exe uses is around 265MB, regardless of how high I set the Transpotition Memory. My computer has 3GB of ram total, and my current processes only use about 500MB. I tried at one point to have 512MB of ram available for transposition, but the Task Manager showed it only using 265MB. Is there a maximum that CMX can use? 256MB?

[KHollister]

Changing Engine Priority does not alter the strength of the engine... it changes the amount of CPU that is used for the engine (versus that of the UI). So if the UI rendering is extremely slow and not responding quickly, changing the Chess Engine Priority to a lower setting should help.

I'm not aware of any kind of maximum limit the transposition table has... I know others have set theirs to 512 MB, but I'm not sure how (or when) that memory is allocated. I'll look into it.

[Jason2004s]

Ok thanks.

I'm having no problems with the UI. I was just trying to see if I have made CMX as powerful as it can get on my computer. The Engine Priority is set to 4 (highest). From what the reply said, this means that the engine will be stronger, but only at the expense of the UI, and not because more CPU ability is being devoted to it, in general. This maked sense.

I have been having CM analyze a position overnight with Transposition Memory set to 512 MB, but Task Manager still shows only 265MB being used. Maybe the limit is 256MB (plus another 9MB for other things that TheKing.exe does, for a total of 265MB)?

Mainly I am asking these questions because I am having CM analyze some pretty complicated positions, and I want CM to be able to see as deeply into them as possible.

[bob_deloach]

I use CM9; hope this helps:

http://www.utzingerk.com/cm9_skr_report.htm

I lo?e playing games on ChessMaster; but I use Fritz X for analysis. Fritz runs rings around CM for deep analysis!!!

Also, you can get different opinions with other UCI engines like Junior or Fruit and they all do it much, much faster than CM.

[KHollister]

True, other engines may do a deeper analysis than Chessmaster, but Chessmaster explains it's analysis in a way that's easier for beginners to understand.

Other engines present you a list of moves (and very fast), but they don't explain why one move is better than another. I've spoken with other players who have said, "Fritz recommends this move over that"; but when I ask them to explain why, they can't.

[bob_deloach]

You're absolutly correct! But I've found a 'work-around'. I play games against a slightly stronger(around 200pts)personality in CM. Then I use Fritz to analyze the entire game out to 21 moves using an appropriate 'blunder level'. I use one third of a pawn; a beginner should use 3 pawns. Then the 'Why' becomes pretty obvious!