Fritz 15 coming in november

where did you buy it from?  It is unclear if it was a download or real mdeai from several of the online stores I was looking at.

I bought it on chessbase presale, I can use it right now although i didnt activate the software yet (dont have serial yet) After i install simply closed the screen it asks for serial

What is the use of paying money for it? Pretty useless considering there are free alternatives.

I didnt have any money and used pirate fritz so far, i like fritz (and old chessmaster) its expensive for me but i wanted to own 1. I still cant afford chessbase (considering its price more than 3 month salary of mine i dont see i can buy it on short term) I liked F15 compared to F14 in some details but didnt noticed something sharply revolutionary yet. Still using it without serial (they will send serial at 25th) As far as playing strength i can say 3180 Elo, i made it match Komodo 9.2 around 40-50 blitz games last night so far result says -258 Elo compared to Komodo ( draws %40 of games loses others) its much more stronger than Fritz 14 but not in competition with Stockfish and Komodo.

I like it says what is on position while playing, yeah give me the open file, that pawn might be problem etc. He talks a lot while playing, he talks like joke but most of them actually gives insight about what fritz thinks important about position.

They removed fun playing styles, but adapting engine strength, whatever level i choose initially i found fritz's playing week for a few games (slightly) then he started to give me hard competition after then it soften a bit. No exactly my strength (because my play wasnt stabile) but i enjoyed the competition. The engines i admire most are komodo, hiarcs and latest fritz. (Komodo obviously good positional play, hiarcs imitates human who likes pawn structure, space and outposts, fritz imitates and aggressive human attacker with some positional understanding) I found stockfish's chess a bit boring and houdini tries to be tal.

Both stockfish and komodo are positional engines but komodo has much lower draw rate because it tries to achieve something even dull positions which i like. Plays like karpov :)

After some more games Fritz 15s performance comparetively to Komodo 9.2 is -241 ~3200 Elo

2.5 times slower in calculation compared to Komodo9.2

and 3 times slower in comparison to Stockfish 6

But in a seemingly dull position Fritz 15 found and incredibly strong move (@ depth 14) while stockfish and komodo werent aware of it.

Later Stockfish @22 and Komodo @19 found the tactic as well, at starting position although they consider similar positions for 1.d4 and Nf3

Stockfish says 1.e4 e6=

Komodo prefers italian game with d3 is slightly better for white

Fritz thinks exchange variation in Ruy Lopez is whites best try with e4

All 3 engine think 1d4 = 1Nf3 > 1e4

You really have no clue if you think this has any meaning.

For the people who bought Fritz 15, please answer the question I posted here. http://www.chess.com/forum/view/chess-equipment/fritz-15-question

Thanks.

Thanks for doing the tests little_paw! 

I also bought Fritz 15 yesterday (directly from chessbase). This is the first time I used Fritz (have been using various free software so far) and I have mixed feelings, it feels buggy. In the mere 2 hours of using it I already found a couple of UI glitches, one of them particularly annoying: the "Explain All Moves" option doesn't work for me. If I enable it, it gets disabled (unchecked) immediately. I tried it with and without 'Enable training' option, in own games and with games coming from included database. I found some short tutorials on that functionality for Fritz 13/14 and also checked Fritz 15 online manual and that functionality should be super easy to use and should just work, no special game setup or any other prerequisites needed for it to work. Now, in my short exploration of the UI I managed to get "Explain All Moves" option work just once, but I have no idea why it suddenly worked (I didn't do anything special as far as I can tell) and of course after a restart it wouldn't work anymore.

Another issue - from time to time all the "Training" options get greyed-out (disabled) with no apparent reason. The only way to get them back is to restart Fritz.

Also hit an issue where the coach got confused while I was learning an opening - it was saying e.g. "e2 - e4 is not correct move for opening ...", and then suggested this exact move as the correct one! I'm not sure what I did though to trigger it, so may be hard to reproduce. And by the way, in Fritz 15 online manual you can find references to 'Komodo', I know it's nitpicking, but still... feels like something was rushed.

To summarize, for a price of 69 EUR I feel disappointed. After using some free programs (which all have their little issues) I was hoping for a polished product and a smooth experience. I hope they can iron out all the most visible bugs soon. What is your experience with version 15 so far? Any advice about "Explain All Moves" option? Am I missing something there?

I never noticed or used the feature before, it tried after you said it, its probably a feature intended for beginners. When you click it it opens new pane with fritz 15 engine opened with it (using less cpu and very small ram 8mb, so much less stronger) And it analysize every single move given in position, only checking a few moves depth. It basically tries to tell most basic features of the move, you losing some material after doing that, this move pinning that, getting that open file etc. If no comment given with the move than it means engine doesnt think that move is very very weak but can't explain what that move exactly tries as well.

I bought it outside EU download option 58euro and it gives 6 months premium 5x6 = 30 euro, so basically i payed 28 euro for it. Having access to chessbase premium you have access to live database + some videos not too much but something like at least 100-200 hours it seems and other features, playing at playchess, premium events, live shows, videos etc happening there. Program also have some training features ranging from absolute beginners to somewhat intermediate level, you need to configure databases for that, you can simply use its regular database but you also can use customized database you created for training for better efficiency (you dont buy training material but ability use your own training material with program, of course you can create some training database with fritz if you put work. It also offers analysis of your games with favourite engine you bought, download etc. (Default is fritz) Analysis of a complete database (if you collect your games in a database instead of analysis each one seperately you assign it with database and leave it a few hours alone. But mostly you purchase it for engine itself. Not for strength but playing against it, it is less stronger than Komodo or stockfish but it lowers its strength more beautiful way (adjusts i mean) I didnt noticed any bug so far. Just i needed to activate twice because my laptop battery went off while it was working the first time so i cant say its a bug. I used it around 20-30 hours last 2-3 days and cant remember single bug yet. You may consider starting it admin mode if you are using windows 8 or 10 which restricts its access to some database file here or then. Which every chessbase and fritz version having some trouble at W10 (if you dont give it admin rights) but windows 10 is pretty new, i believe either microsoft or chessbase will solve it in following year

For unchecking issues you might be closing newly opening pane ?

Or it might be due to your main engine is fritz and also explain engine is also fritz same time might be problem i dont know. (My main engine was komodo while used it with 0 problems)

It might not be working in playing a game against fritz ?

I dont know it because i didnt experience any problem with it.

Oh my you're right little_paw! 'Explain all moves' works if I set another engine to be the main engine (e.g. Stockfish) - then Fritz is serving 'Explain all moves' option. It seems that there can only be one instance of Fritz engine running at a time. They could have mentioned it somewhere, or show a warning message. Otherwise, silently unchecking 'Explain All Moves' as one clicks it looks like a bug ;)

"Explain all moves" may be a tool for beginners, but it looks useful for learning principles and provides some nice tips for all the moves from current position - some examples: "Not an active square for a knight", "Develops the queen much too early", "Bad development - piece moves again", "Preparing a bishop fianchetto", "Forfeits the right to castle" etc. So, quite some knowledge programmed and explained in human-readable way.

I got fritz 15 yesterday, and I already have fritz 14 on steam (sold by Viva Media) so was interested in trying out fritz 15. The problem is, there doesn't seem to be that many sites talking about this version, so wasn't really sure if getting 15 was going to be worthwhile or not?

Aftyer a bit of time, I think if you have fritz 13 / 14, then upgrading proably will be pointles. I quite like in 14, you can set the strengh of the AI and keep it there, (handicap and fun) still, the new friends mode does seem to be prety good mind. as for bugs, Yes I had to activate the program twice, and another bug that I have noticed is with the new friends mode

I come across a couple of bugs with this new mode
1 - when I play in friends mode, and it flashes a tactical atvantage, (and play for at least 30 moves) after the game, and then I load the game from the autosave DB, in some games (those that have medals beside them) some of the moves past a certain point are truncated (at least 30 moves in, then I see 3 stars and an underline and it no longer shows any more moves in the notation and opening book window. (even though it will play them on the chessboard)(can anyone else confirm this? as I wrote to chessbase support about this and not got a reply yet)

also in friends mode, if you take back a few moves, you can confuse the AI, so it stops working, or even take over the other side (so you play both sides) and there is no "move now" button in friends mode, so that doesn't help if the AI remains stuck)

overall, I think fritz 15 is a bit of a worthless purchess for me, I have 14 and should have stuck at that, (I still got it) but feel that the money spent on 15 isn't really worth it when you got A version of fritz.

in all honeslty, maybe I should have waited for 16? but then again, I also wonder what enhancements 16 will bring? I don't really think the enchancements of 15 really justifies the cost of getting a new version. but that is just me. unless 16 has some major changes, I  don't see how chessbase can keep selling a new version of fritz from here on in.

stockfish 6 is stronger and free.  why pay for fritz if only for the gui if there are many free guis that are easy to use?

matthewfarmery dont think they are bugs, in any mode other than rated one you can force computer play the otherside, simply by playing go button at engine, or taking back 1 move and making a move for opponent.

For 3 stars thing, if you dont like that you can uncheck training mode thing. It turns some mistakes made in game into problems to be solved. İf you see stars after a move it means training is enabled and thats just a training question. After you found out the right move you can go on playing (or if you have found the correct solution in the actual game you can see the rest of your game etc.)

Well i also think they sell it expensive (half of my salary at my part time job here) But if you dont have any fritz (or last 3-4 versions of it) and using chessbase premium (they give you 30 euro worth of it free) and especially outside of eu makes it price 58-30 euro, its just expansive but not too much

I found some other odd behavior. After starting Fritz, open a game from database. Then enable 'Analysis Board' via 'View' menu. This grays out (disables) all Analysis options in the Analysis menu for me (except for "Let's Check Analysis"). Disabling or closing 'Analysis Board' doesn't enable any of the analysis option back though - in fact I couldn't find a way to enable them back other than restarting Fritz. Is this a bug, or am I missing something again?

I tried same thing happened to me as well, couldnt figure out why it happens or if there any reason behind it ? Checked help http://help.chessbase.com/Fritz/15/Eng/index.html but too many things there and couldnt find (may be there is but i couldnt) anything related to. May be its best to ask support about it, if it is a bug then they will fix it in the first update (if they are aware of it) if it is not may be they can help telling why

I have the sneaking suspicion that you guys are the Fritz 15 beta testers.

Ok, thanks for confirming. I've submited this to support (interestingly, F15 is not yet avialble in the support form ;)).

And yes... I truly feel like a beta tester. To anyone considering buying Fritz 15, I suggest you hold on a little bit...