Here is a great archive for pgn and cbh files for games published in books:
http://wwwu.uni-klu.ac.at/gossimit/c/
Don't worry, it's a legal site that respects copyrights. 
Right way to study (at least for me)
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philidor_position wrote:
Here is a great archive for pgn and cbh files for games published in books:
http://wwwu.uni-klu.ac.at/gossimit/c/
Don't worry, it's a legal site that respects copyrights.
Thank you. I saw this site long time ago but lost it since then. Nice stuff! But newer books are not there and I still wish to have pgn for every chess book on earth! Am I too demanding? :-)
Nov 24, 2011
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#4
I've probably converted over 100 chess books in pgn format (without notes). See http://www.gambitchess.com/semi/db1.htm Also see the downloads section here. There ought to be a new effort by folks here to convert the chess books to pgn format.
Nov 24, 2011
0
#5
Well, almost all games in chess books would be played by notable players, so you should be able to find them in any comprehensive database. You can start checking out chess.com's online database:
http://www.chess.com/explorer/
You can also try
http://sourceforge.net/projects/icofybase/files/icofybase/
and regularly update that huge database with the frequent TWICs.
http://www.chess.co.uk/twic/twic.html
Since chess became my main hobby few years ago searching for the right way to study was just as interesting as playing the game itself. I've tried many different methods and approaches, Chessbase products, videos etc. and understood that nothing works better for me than old good chess book. But not just a book alone – you need 3 components:
1) a book
2) an accompanying PGN file
3) a chess software. I used Arena for many years, now switched to Aquarium and like it a lot.
The idea is that any book example is first opened in the software from PGN file. If it is a master game or example of strategy I will go through it trying to guess every move. Then I'll play against an engine in some critical positions. If it is tactics or endgame position I'll play against an engine right away trying to achieve the desired result. Only then will I read the book section relative to this example. As all the variations are still fresh in my head the book comments will usually sink right in. I've dubbed this "active learning" and found it to be few times more effective than just reading through the book – too many times moving pieces on the board while trying to follow book comments and variations at same time would turn for me into something mechanical and dumb.
The main problem however is that you have to have PGN file for a book. Some PGN/CBH files can be found on the web. For other books I had to prepare them myself and it's very time-consuming. I wonder why such files couldn't be made available by book publishers. I mean nowadays every chess book author prepares and checks all the examples on computer. That means they already exist as game collection – why not to make them available for download on publisher's web site? I mean raw PGN/CBH without comments – like this nobody will be tempted to download and use them without buying the book.