Newbie question:

I read people saying that they use Fritz( or a chess engine) to analyze their games and find blunders or other ways they could have better played a match.  I'm no software dummy, but I cannot figure out what this means.  Are they simply playing the game back, or is there a feature/tool in the program that helps evaluate the game?

Many thanks!

For a tutorial on analyzing your games and checking them for blunders using Fritz check out the articles here and here. If you're in a hurry, from the main menu click on Tools | Analysis and then pick either Blundercheck or Full Analysis.

Fantastic, thanks so much forests.

Some practical notes:

• Positions are evaluated in terms of pawns. Eg, +3.00 means White is up about three pawns (basically, a piece). -1.00 means Black is up one pawn.

• Fritz is better at tactical evaluations than positional evaluations. In other words, if they say a move is 1.00 better than the alternative I would trust it, but if it says a move is 0.10 better I probably would not.

• It's a best practice to write out your own notes on the game before you let a computer do so. You learn more that way.  :)

This information is absolutely perfect, the chesscafe articles are exactly what I hoped to find.  This is a ton of info, I don't think I could have ever figured this out on my own just by clicking around. 

Again, many thanks.

Well, Likesforests already answered your question, but here is a visual representation...

Here's a larger view:  http://i35.tinypic.com/21m9pb6.jpg

wow, that's a beautiful board.

You guys are awesome, I can't wait to try this out.