Thank you. I've been wanting to hear if they made any significant improvements. I bought Fritz 13 about 5 months ago and have been satisfied with it. If 14 had some serious upgrades or content improvement I might have bought it. but I rarely if ever use the Fritz engine and if that's the only change there's no reason to shell out close to 100 bucks. I can buy a handful of chess books instead. :) Stockfish, Gull and Bouquet are all stronger than the Fritz engine and they are free.... Anyway, thanks for the review. Think i'll take your advice and wait for 15.
Fritz 14???
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For those in the UK, you can pre-order your copy now from here: http://shop.chess.co.uk/Deep_Fritz_14_PC_DVD_p/pre-order-131230.htm
As far as which GUI features might have changed, I don't know. But as far as the engine is concerned, the guys on Talkchess have discovered that there's a new programmer for the DF14 engine. Frans Morsch was the programmer for previous Fritz versions, but Gyula Horvath is the programmer for the DF14 engine. Horvath is also the programmer for the strong, private engine Pandix.
So the characteristics and personality of the DF14 engine seem to be an unknown at the moment.
Here is the CB announcement: http://en.chessbase.com/post/deep-fritz-14-faster-better-cheaper
In essence, CB is selling the same GUI which was first released in 2011 with a slightly stronger engine for $80. I doubt that the new engine will be as strong as Houdini 3, and in any case Houdini 4 is right around the corner. Another selling point is the Let's Check feature, which is nothing more than an attempt to profit from user-generated content.
My advice: don't keep buying the same GUI over and over, which in turn might actually encourage CB to inovate and provide new features, rather than selling you the same thing. Instead of wasting your money, wait for Houdini 4 and buy directly from the developer: http://www.cruxis.com/chess/houdini.htm
Agree. There are a lot of details about the GUI that I need to know have been improved. The engine is not the point.
I think I can see a pattern. If they wanted to really improve the GUI, they would need to hire a dedicated GUI programmer that can make real improvements to the GUI, fix the bugs and understands exactly what the average chess players needs are.
But that costs money and it wouldn't fit into their business model. They are also fighting a whole raft of people who try to crack the program which is wrong and evil but difficult to stop.
My computer will not run Deep Fritz 14. I would purchase just a standard 14 I am bit of a collector when it comes to fritz software. I have fritz 5.32 thru Fritz 13.
I don't know what they were thinking when they came out with Deep Fritz 14.
The people who think fritz is too complicated and just want to play chess will certainly not want deep fritz14.
The people who like fast engines don't use the fritz engine anyway.
People who buy the fritz 10,11,12 etc were satisfied with the fritz 13 and its ribbon and lets check features and wouldn't have any interest in flooding there computer with the deep fritz 14.
Also why the expiration date on the lets check feature????
There is no single core engine as similar to versions 7,8,9,10,11,12,13.
Nothing in this version has been improved from 13 which makes sense because 13 was a vast improvement (maybe even 12) over previous versions.
Chessbase has the capability to add tons of improvements if they would want to. For example: nabilov endgame tablebases, an improved opening theory similar to the powerbook. Commentary analysis for the billion games they give you similar to megadatabase and opening book dvd. Some dvd videos from chess grandmasters.
All of this and more they could give a sample of but this version is just an improved engine to compete with the rybkas, houdinis etc. If your not an engine vs engine player I'd say skip this version wait yet again for the next version which will hopefully have some nice features similar to the 12, 13 upgrade. Oh one other thing 14 costs to much for the typical fritz user. $95. Yuck!!!. I'm skipping this one.