Chess Challenger 7 Vs Boris

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Fernando
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Chess Challenger 7 Vs Boris

Post by Fernando »

Do you remember a Popular Mechanics magazine where a guy pitted Fidelity 7 against Boris?
Both of them were weak machines, BUT not that weak as the examples given in another thread. The "tournament" of two or three games was won convincingly by Fidelity and the games were not that preposterous....

Fern
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Steve B
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Post by Steve B »

I vaguely remember that article

An actual whole book was written in 1980 which was all about beating Boris
it also had a few games with the CC7:
Image

several of the games show Pin blunders
:P

Pin Head Regards
Steve
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Fernando
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Post by Fernando »

Steve B wrote:I vaguely remember that article

An actual whole book was written in 1980 which was all about beating Boris
it also had a few games with the CC7:
Image

several of the games show Pin blunders
:P

Pin Head Regards
Steve
I remember, too, the book.
In the preface the author tell that he had a nightmare: in the future a guy called Steven was going to make fun of his work.
He then swore revenge.
An awful promise.
He would come back from hell to put flames in your collection.
Any day.

Beware regards
Fern
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chesspcmac
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Post by chesspcmac »

I heard Boris likes to play The Alapin variation a lot

smiling regards


Mike
"Sir, the slowness of genius is hard to bear, but the slowness of mediocrity is insufferable"

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Steve B
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Post by Steve B »

Fernando wrote: Image


I remember, too, the book.
In the preface the author tell that he had a nightmare: in the future a guy called Steven
A long time ago...
35 years

Where O Where Have The Years Gone Regards?
Steve
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Cyberchess
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Post by Cyberchess »

Greetings!

While I don’t recall the Popular Mechanics article or the book on beating Boris, I can clearly remember the name being bandied about back in the day. Boris, as I recall, was released between the CC3 and the CC7 in 1978. Applied Concepts would later make a travel version of Boris. Incidentally, 1978 was also the year that I.C.D. was founded in Bellemore, NY, and I can imagine Steve (the owner) touting the virtues of this high-tech marvel to curious passersby.

What I liked about the original Boris was the nice wooden case and quality Pacific Games Co. simulated wood magnetic chess set. A chess player that I know purchased a non-working Boris for next to nothing just to obtain the no longer made chess set. I’ve also seen quite a few like-new units sell for only a few bucks on the bay.

Toys of Yore Regards,
John
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Fernando
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Post by Fernando »

Cyberchess wrote:Greetings!

While I don’t recall the Popular Mechanics article or the book on beating Boris, I can clearly remember the name being bandied about back in the day. Boris, as I recall, was released between the CC3 and the CC7 in 1978. Applied Concepts would later make a travel version of Boris. Incidentally, 1978 was also the year that I.C.D. was founded in Bellemore, NY, and I can imagine Steve (the owner) touting the virtues of this high-tech marvel to curious passersby.

What I liked about the original Boris was the nice wooden case and quality Pacific Games Co. simulated wood magnetic chess set. A chess player that I know purchased a non-working Boris for next to nothing just to obtain the no longer made chess set. I’ve also seen quite a few like-new units sell for only a few bucks on the bay.

Toys of Yore Regards,
John

There was also an ugly plastic version, Boris Diplomat. Worst design ever...
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Cyberchess
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Post by Cyberchess »

That sounds like the travel version. I believe that it also came with a cheap plastic peg set - yuck! :x
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Post by klute »

Cyberchess wrote:That sounds like the travel version. I believe that it also came with a cheap plastic peg set - yuck!
I actually quite like the design and appearance of the Diplomat in a retro kind of way, at least the second brown version.

Tonight on a whim and feeling nostalgic, I decided to make mine play itself at 3 minutes (or more precisely, approximately 3 minutes worth of chronicled standardized time units for comparative play) per move:

1. d4 d5 2. Nc3 Nf6 3. f3 Nc6 4. Bf4 Na5 5. e4 dxe4 6. Rb1 exf3 7. Nxf3 Nc6 8.
d5 Nb4 9. Bb5+ c6 10. dxc6 Nxc2+ 11. Qxc2 Nd5 12. cxb7+ Bd7 13. Nxd5 Bxb5 14.
Nc7+ Qxc7 15. Bxc7 Rd8 16. Rc1 Bd3 17. Qd2 e5 18. Bxd8 Bb4 19. Qxb4 Bb1 20.
Qe7# 1-0

One struggles to find an appropriate adjective to describe a game like this - perhaps "interesting" is the most ...

... diplomatic Regards
The Klute offers you the white pieces and the advantage of the first move.
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Fernando
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Post by Fernando »

klute wrote:
Cyberchess wrote:That sounds like the travel version. I believe that it also came with a cheap plastic peg set - yuck!
I actually quite like the design and appearance of the Diplomat in a retro kind of way, at least the second brown version.

Tonight on a whim and feeling nostalgic, I decided to make mine play itself at 3 minutes (or more precisely, approximately 3 minutes worth of chronicled standardized time units for comparative play) per move:

1. d4 d5 2. Nc3 Nf6 3. f3 Nc6 4. Bf4 Na5 5. e4 dxe4 6. Rb1 exf3 7. Nxf3 Nc6 8.
d5 Nb4 9. Bb5+ c6 10. dxc6 Nxc2+ 11. Qxc2 Nd5 12. cxb7+ Bd7 13. Nxd5 Bxb5 14.
Nc7+ Qxc7 15. Bxc7 Rd8 16. Rc1 Bd3 17. Qd2 e5 18. Bxd8 Bb4 19. Qxb4 Bb1 20.
Qe7# 1-0

One struggles to find an appropriate adjective to describe a game like this - perhaps "interesting" is the most ...

... diplomatic Regards
Well, in any case the poor creature played until move 19. Not that bad considering your strength.

Fern
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klute
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Post by klute »

Fernando wrote:Well, in any case the poor creature played until move 19. Not that bad considering your strength.
But this game was Diplomat playing against itself!
The Klute offers you the white pieces and the advantage of the first move.
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Fernando
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Post by Fernando »

klute wrote:
Fernando wrote:Well, in any case the poor creature played until move 19. Not that bad considering your strength.
But this game was Diplomat playing against itself!

As yanquees like to say...

OH MY GOD
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Post by Mike Watters »

Fern

Not sure but I think the Popular Mechanics article you were talking about is this one -
http://www.chesscomputeruk.com/Popular_ ... y_1979.pdf
If not, still good reading for oldies wanting a nostalgia fix.

There are around 70 old chess computer/computer chess articles in my Publications Archive now, plus the Computer Chess Digests and Computer Chess Reports. You can find them here -

http://www.chesscomputeruk.com/html/pub ... chive.html

All the best
Mike
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Post by Monsieur Plastique »

Fernando wrote:
As yanquees like to say...

OH MY GOD
I have often contemplated over the years writing a "chess program in a spreadsheet". Something whereby an accountant in an idle moment can flip windows from the number crunching financial model and have nice game of chess without having to exit from Excel.

I had always thought the idea to be completely silly because it would be so weak, especially so given I would program it. But the game Klute posted where Diplomat played itself has inspired me. It seems to me that once a program has been written that plays legal chess and has a working move generator, that is 90% of the work needed to beat the Diplomat!
Chess is like painting the Mona Lisa whilst walking through a minefield.
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Post by Cyberchess »

Monsieur Plastique wrote:
Fernando wrote:
As yanquees like to say...

OH MY GOD
I have often contemplated over the years writing a "chess program in a spreadsheet". Something whereby an accountant in an idle moment can flip windows from the number crunching financial model and have nice game of chess without having to exit from Excel.
Back in my days as a junior programmer, I learned the ropes the hard way. When I was new and eager to prove my worth, I would work slavishly to complete my assignment. My reward for all the extra toil was to have another wheelbarrow dumped on my desk. While my colleagues were still working on their first assignment, I was struggling to complete my second. I would later comment on how even a dog would learn not to finish assignments too early. Henceforth, whenever I was ahead of schedule, I would simply load a TSR DOS based chess program stored on floppy disc into memory. The game could be called up at any time, and any of the pre-defined Hot Keys would terminate the program in the blink of an eye.

Slacker Regards,
John
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