Stockfish 1 with 12 threads and 2 hours vs Stockfish 17.1 with 12 threads and 1 minute, who wins?

An old discussion people have had is if you give a weaker but solid engine enough time would it be able to match the strength of a much stronger engine? So I thought it'd be interesting to do a little experiment and do a game between Stockfish 1 with 12 threads and 2 hours vs Stockfish 17.1 with 12 threads and just 1 minute. Before I give you the game let me quickly give some info on the history of these two engines:

Stockfish 1 broke into the scene in 2008 and in 2011 they released the final and strongest version of Stockfish 1x series, Stockfish 1.9.1. CCRL rated it at 3148 in their 40/15 list when running on 4 threads. I know that CCRL ratings aren't the same as FIDE ratings but I'm guessing that if it runs on 12 threads it should be playing around the 2900 FIDE range if given 2 hours for a game.

Stockfish 17.1 was released earlier this year and on 4 threads it is rated 3644 in CCRL's 40/15 list. So that's almost 500 elo stronger than Stockfish 1.9.1.

So if there’s a 500-Elo gap between them, could Stockfish 1.9.1 beat Stockfish 17.1 by having 120 times more time to think? So the old engine gets 2 hours versus the new engine getting only 1 minute for the entire game. I put it to a test and here's what I got:

[Event "\[03\] Engine Match (01/11/2025)"]
[Site "Local computer"]
[Date "2025.11.01"]
[Round "1"]
[White "Stockfish 1.9.1 JA 64bit 12CPU"]
[Black "Stockfish 17.1 12CPU"]
[Result "0-1"]
[ECO "D38"]
[PlyCount "160"]
[EventDate "2025.??.??"]

1. d4 Nf6 2. Nf3 e6 3. c4 d5 4. Nc3 Bb4 5. Qa4+ Nc6 6. e3 O-O 7. Bd2 dxc4 8. Bxc4 Bd6 9. Nb5 Bd7 10. Nxd6 cxd6 11. Qa3 Rc8 12. Rc1 d5 13. Bd3 Ne4 14. O-O Nxd2 15. Nxd2 Qe7 16. Qxe7 Nxe7 17. f3 Rxc1 18. Rxc1 Rc8 19. Rxc8+ Nxc8 20. Kf2 Nb6 21. b3 Kf8 22. e4 dxe4 23. fxe4 h6 24. Ke3 f6 25. a4 Ke7 26. Nb1 e5 27. Nd2 Nc8 28. d5 Kd6 29. Nf3 Kc5 30. Bc2 b5 31. axb5 Nd6 32. b6 axb6 33. h3 Kb4 34. Nd2 Kc3 35. Bd3 b5 36. Bb1 Nb7 37. Bd3 Nd6 38. Bb1 h5 39. Bd3 h4 40. Be2 f5 41. Bd1 f4+ 42. Ke2 b4 43. Ke1 Bb5 44. Nf3 Bd3 45. Nxe5 Bxe4 46. Bf3 Bc2 47. Bd1 Kxb3 48. Ng6 Kb2 49. Nxf4 b3 50. Ke2 Kc3 51. Bxc2 Kxc2 52. Nd3 Nc4 53. Nb4+ Kc3 54. Nd3 Kd4 55. d6 Nxd6 56. Nb2 Nc4 57. Na4 Ne5 58. Kd2 g5 59. Kd1 Nc4 60. Ke2 b2 61. Nxb2 Nxb2 62. Kf3 Nc4 63. Kf2 Kd3 64. g3 Nd2 65. g4 Nc4 66. Ke1 Ke3 67. Kd1 Ne5 68. Ke1 Nd3+ 69. Kd1 Nf4 70. Ke1 Nxh3 71. Kf1 Nf2 72. Kg2 Nxg4 73. Kh3 Nf2+ 74. Kg2 g4 75. Kg1 Kf3 76. Kf1 Nd3 77. Kg1 g3 78. Kf1 h3 79. Kg1 h2+ 80. Kh1 Nf2# 0-1

Note that neither side had a book and when the game ended Stockfish 1.9.1 still had just under 6 minutes left on its clock and Stockfish 17.1 just had milliseconds remaining. With just 1 minute for the entire game it's an amazing achievement by Stockfish 17.1.

I did a game review here at chess.com using max settings and it gave Stockfish 1.9.1 an accuracy score of 91.5 and a game rating of 2450 and Stockfish 17.1 got 98.2 and a game rating of 2500 (it seems to max out at 2500).

Great

w1

1b

Inaccuracy

w3

According to the game review white's inaccuracies were 35.Bd3 (-2.61), 43.Ke1 (-4.11), and 64.g3 (-M20), and white's mistakes were 28.d5 (-0.97) and 33.h3 (-1.66). Let's take a closer look at these errors:

35.Bd3 (-2.61). Better is 35.Bd1 but maybe it's already lost as the score is down to -2.91 according to cloud Stockfish 16 at depth 49. Out of curiosity I looked at what cloud SF16 thinks of the played move 35.Bd1 and at depth 44 it's at -3.22.

43.Ke1 (-4.11). No this might be the best move, at depth 41 cloud SF16 says this is best with a score of -4.87.

64.g3 (-M20). Well 64.Kf3 is cloud SF16's top move at depth 82 with a score of -M19. I had it look at 64.g3 and it says -M18.

28.d5 (-0.97). Cloud SF16 says 28.a5 is best and 0.0 at depth 58.

33.h3 (-1.66). Cloud SF16 says 33.Nh4 is best and -0.92 at depth 50

So in conclusion I don't think giving an old engine enough time would ever make it as strong as today's top engines. Today's engines have better understanding of all phases of the game. Giving an old engine more time will increase its strength but only to a certain limit, possibly around 400 elo maximum increase.