Mephisto Chess Challenger secret options menu?

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diabloNL
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Mephisto Chess Challenger secret options menu?

Post by diabloNL »

Hi all,

I have bought a couple of chess computers and one of them is a Mephisto Chess Challenger. By accident I found an extra option menu which gives me the following options that I can turn on or of (+/-). To get the extra options you need to press "Go/Stop" when it is off together with the option button at the same time. A low beep indicates the extra options have been activated. To turn it off you can press "Go/Stop" with "Level" together.

The extra options I get are the following. I'm trying to understand what they all do so any help is appreciated! The manual obviously doesn't explain!

The book option seems to turn the opening book off since the computer has to think longer as normal.

- SEL
-EASY
-RAND
+BOOK
-BK:FL
-BK:PA
-BK:AT
-BK:TN (could also be BK:TM)

Thanks for any help!
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Re: Mephisto Chess Challenger secret options menu?

Post by Steve B »

diabloNL wrote:Hi all,

I have bought a couple of chess computers and one of them is a Mephisto Chess Challenger. By accident I found an extra option menu which gives me the following options that I can turn on or of (+/-). To get the extra options you need to press "Go/Stop" when it is off together with the option button at the same time. A low beep indicates the extra options have been activated. To turn it off you can press "Go/Stop" with "Level" together.

The extra options I get are the following. I'm trying to understand what they all do so any help is appreciated! The manual obviously doesn't explain!

The book option seems to turn the opening book off since the computer has to think longer as normal.

- SEL
-EASY
-RAND
+BOOK
-BK:FL
-BK:PA
-BK:AT
-BK:TN (could also be BK:TM)

Thanks for any help!
Hi
i just tried this on my Challenger and you are right
these options are not documented in the manual and they are available using the procedure you described
i am not sure however how many of these options are actually working in the Challenger

regardless if they are working or not here is what they stand for...

- SEL--Switches from a selective search routine to a Brute force search
-EASY--disables the computers ability to think while the player is on the move
-RAND-makes the computer choose between two moves with evaluations that are close and not only pick the strongest/ same move every time
+BOOK turns the computers book on or off
-BK:FL-computer uses its full book
-BK:PA-computer uses a book with more passive moves
-BK:AT-computer uses a book with more active or attacking moves
-BK:TN -computer only uses its tournament(strongest book)

i did test the BOOK On/OFF Option and it does work as you mentioned

Secret Handshake Regards
Steve
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diabloNL
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Post by diabloNL »

Thanks Steve! I wasn't expecting a reply with all the answers so fast but this is great. I will play around with it and especially with the EASY function. I just started playing chess and having the computer think on my time is not so great. I mean; I can set it to 1 sec but if I think 10 min. he also will think for 10 min. :)

Would you say it's better to turn off the opening book for a beginner or is it better to leave it on to learn?

Also, I'm wondering why the opening book is not On fully by default (unless that function doesn't work when enabled).

Thanks again!
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Post by Steve B »

diabloNL wrote:Would you say it's better to turn off the opening book for a beginner or is it better to leave it on to learn?
as a beginner it think it best you play normally against the computer as you would a real person
after all if you sit down opposite a live human being you cant ask him to turn off his opening book
:P
set it to the full book option which will provide you with a variety of openings to contend with

the best function to disengage would be the pondering(easy) function
as a new player this will allow you to think about your move without worrying that the computer is also thinking

Enjoy Regards
Steve
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diabloNL
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Post by diabloNL »

Thanks Steve, I like your idea of keeping the book on and set it to easy. Every minute I think I get nervous that the computer has already tried hundreds of moves!

If the "BOOK" option is on by default but all other book options are off I wonder what he uses. The most logic option would probably be the full book but that is off by default.
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Re: Mephisto Chess Challenger secret options menu?

Post by SirDave »

diabloNL wrote:Hi all,

I have bought a couple of chess computers and one of them is a Mephisto Chess Challenger. By accident I found an extra option menu which gives me the following options that I can turn on or of (+/-). To get the extra options you need to press "Go/Stop" when it is off together with the option button at the same time. A low beep indicates the extra options have been activated. To turn it off you can press "Go/Stop" with "Level" together. The extra options I get are the following. I'm trying to understand what they all do so any help is appreciated! The manual obviously doesn't explain! The book option seems to turn the opening book off since the computer has to think longer as normal.

- SEL
-EASY
-RAND
+BOOK
-BK:FL
-BK:PA
-BK:AT
-BK:TN (could also be BK:TM)
diabloNL, given that there seems to be very little that hasn't been discovered in dedicated chess boards these days (except for which boards Ron Nelson programmed :)), IMO your finding is actually in the 'astounding' category. (Many, many thanks-how did you find this out?)

I say this because the Mephisto Chess Challenger (which has been available for several years) has been one of the more underrated chess boards (I bought one in brand-new condition last year for $25 as a backup for my main one) if one considers that the Elo is a little over 2000 and it offers a nice range of options. It has sold in the past on eBay for ridiculously low prices (though that may be changing as nice boards seem to show up less and less on eBay).

However, my one big reservation about the Chess Challenger was always the lack of options (particularly +/- EASY ie. ponder) that you have now discovered are actually available (if they work and I believe they do!). That leaves the only benefits of Chess Challenger's big brother, the Master Chess, over the Chess Challenger as being memory for the last 200 individual moves (ply) vs. 50, a bump-up of Elo of about 100-150 and a larger Book, 50,000 vs. 6,000 (though I'm suspicious about the 50,000 figure.).

For the benefit of anyone who wants to take advantage of these extra options, here are the full instructions (some of which were not mentioned above):

To turn these options on:
With the board totally off Press GO/STOP and OPTION together at exactly the same time. You should be greeted by +SEL. If, instead, you get -bron, +Auto, or -rd 1, then try pressing OPTION sequentially and you will likely get the sequence -bron->+Auto->+SEL->-rd 1 (or something similar depending on which option showed up first). If you don't get +SEL at all, then you didn't press the two keys EXACTLY together. Try again; it will work.

To turn each option ON or OFF:
Press the ENTER key eg. pressing ENTER will cycle between -SEL and +SEL.

To cycle thru the options:
Press the (White <or>) keys.

Alternatively, TO IMMEDIATELY SELECT AN OPTION, you can simply press the squares indicated in the square brackets beside each option below . You can turn the option ON or OFF by pressing the same square again:

- SEL (Selective/Brute Force Search) [A2]
-EASY (Permanent Brain/Ponder on/off) [B2]
-rand (RAND = Randomize Play) [C2]
+bOOk (BOOK = Book on/off) [D2}
-bk:FL (Full Book) [E2]
-bk:Pa (Passive Book) [F2]
-bk:at (Active Book) [G2]
-bk:tn (Tournament Book) [H2]

To deactivate the the availability of these options:
As diabloNL mentioned, you can press GO/STOP and LEVEL at exactly the same time.

However, it turns out that there is a quirk related to the availability of the options: If you have one of them showing on the LCD, say, +book, and then you turn the board off (ie. press GO/STOP) and then turn it on again, +book will still show on the LCD, but any attempt to change it to -book by pressing ENTER or any attempt to select another option by pressing the WHITE/BLACK keys or press squares A2->H2 will result in one of the variation selections (eg. -rd 4 or somesuch) showing on the screen. The options will essentially be now unavailable.

In other words, I think one can assume that to gain access to these options for any particular playing session, you'll have to use the GO/STOP+OPTION routine at the beginning each time, because, once you turn the unit off, those options are likely gone.
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Post by SirDave »

A small part of the above got mangled. It should be:

To cycle thru the options:
Press the WHITE or BLACK (ie. left arrow or right arrow) keys.
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Re: Mephisto Chess Challenger secret options menu?

Post by Steve B »

SirDave wrote:
IMO your finding is actually in the 'astounding' category. (Many, many thanks-how did you find this out?)


To turn these options on:
With the board totally off Press GO/STOP and OPTION together at exactly the same time.
many of the worlds greatest discoveries were by sheer accident
i wonder if diabloNL just stumbled upon this by accident?
The Option key and GO/STOP keys are next to each other so perhaps he pressed both at the same time unintentionally ?


Astounded As Well Regards
Steve
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Re: Mephisto Chess Challenger secret options menu?

Post by diabloNL »

SirDave wrote:
diabloNL wrote:Hi all,

I have bought a couple of chess computers and one of them is a Mephisto Chess Challenger. By accident I found an extra option menu which gives me the following options that I can turn on or of (+/-). To get the extra options you need to press "Go/Stop" when it is off together with the option button at the same time. A low beep indicates the extra options have been activated. To turn it off you can press "Go/Stop" with "Level" together. The extra options I get are the following. I'm trying to understand what they all do so any help is appreciated! The manual obviously doesn't explain! The book option seems to turn the opening book off since the computer has to think longer as normal.

- SEL
-EASY
-RAND
+BOOK
-BK:FL
-BK:PA
-BK:AT
-BK:TN (could also be BK:TM)
diabloNL, given that there seems to be very little that hasn't been discovered in dedicated chess boards these days (except for which boards Ron Nelson programmed :)), IMO your finding is actually in the 'astounding' category. (Many, many thanks-how did you find this out?)


However, my one big reservation about the Chess Challenger was always the lack of options (particularly +/- EASY ie. ponder) that you have now discovered are actually available (if they work and I believe they do!). That leaves the only benefits of Chess Challenger's big brother, the Master Chess, over the Chess Challenger as being memory for the last 200 individual moves (ply) vs. 50, a bump-up of Elo of about 100-150 and a larger Book, 50,000 vs. 6,000 (though I'm suspicious about the 50,000 figure.).

Hi SirDave! Thanks for the kind words and to add to the instructions to make it more clear. Very helpful indeed!

I just downloaded the Master Chess manual where it actually explains what each functions does except for the "Easy" function. :)

Since "everyone" is eager to know how I found this hidden function I will explain the event a bit. Like explained earlier I have just bought the Chess Challenger from a trade site for €50. The computer was advertised as being good as new and it does look very good visually. There is a minor "issue" where some of the buttons don't work as well as I would like to see. Being an electronic engineer (partially, because I'm also a programmer), I'm quite comfortable to fix these kind of things myself.

I always loved chess computers when I was younger and recently I started to look around and decided I want to buy a couple before you can't obtain them anymore. I'm also looking for a wooden chess computer and I'm thinking to buy a Conchess. They are offered quite regularly and it seems not too many are interested due to it is prone to issues with the reed contacts and buttons. My idea is to buy one and replace all reed contacts and maybe even change the LED color.

I also considered buying a Fidelity Chess Challenger 9 and move the internals over to a normal chess board with space to fit the electronics. I think that could be a nice project. Problem is that the FCC 9 is not easy converted to reed contacts since it uses push buttons (pulse from and to). The idea was to use the FFC 9 because of the 64 LED's on all fields.

So, it was a combination of two things that made this discovery possible. First I was checking which buttons are not responding to my liking. The second condition was because of what seems to be a bug in the boards software. When you set the board to silent you can not turn it off by using the Go/Stop button for some reason. The display flickers but it doesn't switch off in 99% of the cases. By playing with the buttons (pressing them simultaneously to determine which buttons needs to be improved) I stumbled upon this extra menu.

I tried some other key combinations and there was one that gave me a series of beeps which are not part of the normal operation. The display however, did not respond to it so I'm not sure if it changed something.

I will play a bit more when I get back home tonight, just for fun!
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diabloNL
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Post by diabloNL »

Some pictures for the ones interested how the Chess Challenger looks inside.

Image

Button interface. Note how some names on the board are not corresponding to the names on the casing. For example: Go/Stop is switched with Studies.
Image

Fixing the buttons which didn't respond as good as I would like. Interesting to see how Saitek taped this type of buttons to the PCB. I would at least make sure all tape was nicely aligned. 8)
Image
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Post by Steve B »

Somehow i just get the feeling that Dave winced in pain after seeing how you took apart the Chess Challenger like that

i know i did regards
Steve
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Re: Mephisto Chess Challenger secret options menu?

Post by BillT »

SirDave wrote:

To turn these options on:
With the board totally off Press GO/STOP and OPTION together at exactly the same time. You should be greeted by +SEL. If, instead, you get -bron, +Auto, or -rd 1, then try pressing OPTION sequentially and you will likely get the sequence -bron->+Auto->+SEL->-rd 1 (or something similar depending on which option showed up first). If you don't get +SEL at all, then you didn't press the two keys EXACTLY together. Try again; it will work.
Sir Dave .

Hope you dont mind but just a small suggestion here is that i've noticed that the easiest way to get into the "extra options" is ---from the off position press and hold OPTION then press GO/STOP whilst still holding down OPTION then let go both buttons.
for the really observant amongst you ,when you are in the "extra options" mode you'll notice also that the beep tone on button pressses is lower pitched.
Probably of no consequence.

I also applaud and thank diabloNL for finding this button squence ...fascinating.
It also makes me think there just has to more of this sort of stuff on other boards too. I'll be up all night now pressing all sorts of buttons on my other boards :lol:

Regards
Bill
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Re: Mephisto Chess Challenger secret options menu?

Post by SirDave »

BillT wrote:
SirDave wrote:

To turn these options on:
With the board totally off Press GO/STOP and OPTION together at exactly the same time. You should be greeted by +SEL. If, instead, you get -bron, +Auto, or -rd 1, then try pressing OPTION sequentially and you will likely get the sequence -bron->+Auto->+SEL->-rd 1 (or something similar depending on which option showed up first). If you don't get +SEL at all, then you didn't press the two keys EXACTLY together. Try again; it will work.
Sir Dave .

Hope you dont mind but just a small suggestion here is that i've noticed that the easiest way to get into the "extra options" is ---from the off position press and hold OPTION then press GO/STOP whilst still holding down OPTION then let go both buttons.
for the really observant amongst you ,when you are in the "extra options" mode you'll notice also that the beep tone on button pressses is lower pitched.
Probably of no consequence.

I also applaud and thank diabloNL for finding this button squence ...fascinating.
It also makes me think there just has to more of this sort of stuff on other boards too. I'll be up all night now pressing all sorts of buttons on my other boards :lol:

Regards
Bill
That sounds like the most reliable way to make sure the extra options are available. Thanks for the info.
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Post by SirDave »

Steve B wrote:Somehow i just get the feeling that Dave winced in pain after seeing how you took apart the Chess Challenger like that

i know i did regards
Steve
Actually, it makes me rather envious that I don't have those skills to know what the heck I'm doing if I were to open a board up like that!

Just Watch Chess Challengers Start To Appear On eBay Regards,
Dave
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Post by Steve B »

SirDave wrote:
Actually, it makes me rather envious that I don't have those skills to know what the heck I'm doing if I were to open a board up like that!

Just Watch Chess Challengers Start To Appear On eBay Regards,
Dave
not me
the last thing i want to see is the guts of a chess computer
its kinda like seeing the bone scan of a beautiful PlayBoy Bunnie

anyway....
They are already selling them on Sascha's Site
http://www.microsofttranslator.com/bv.a ... 1c462342b8

In Play Regards
Steve
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