It’s tough to keep up without a computer
Saturday, April 3, 2010 2:49 AM
Today’s chess professionals are a far cry from earlier generations of grandmasters who often enjoyed a leisurely lifestyle.
Computers have raised the ante. If your opponent uses one, you have little choice but to do the same.
More than a decade ago, U.S. grandmaster Larry Christiansen complained about what he called “butt-busters”: those who had obsessively embraced the use of computer programs for opening preparation.
He deplored the long hours they spent crunching chess moves. Adopting their lifestyle was not an option for the three-time U.S. champion.
Today, of course, computer-based chess is the norm – so much so that Magnus Carlsen recently revealed that his usual tool to represent chess positions is a virtual one: a computer program and console, not the customary three- dimensional chess set.
Adjusting to the technology is especially difficult for older players. One of the strongest grandmasters of his generation, 79-year-old Viktor Korchnoi, said:
“I think that now I am very weak in opening theory, since I do not work very confidently with a computer. Young opponents constantly outplay me in the initial stage.”
Source: Columbus Dispatch
Computer is must today.
a big advantage is the time saved by not having to set up and move pieces, even aside from using the computers to analyze.
chess is finished. find something else to do.
Chess is finished. Play shogi, or go.
For the life of me, I don’t understand why checkers isn’t being played on a 19×19 board or so. Can you imagine how fun that would be? The jump sequences would be incredible.
I never use a computer for chess analysis! I’d rather just stop playing chess! Todays top players just aren’t as good as say, Fischer, Tal or Morphy! Their tactical combinations were their own briliant minds. Top players today just memorize tactics from a program rather than actually calculate something original. How can they take credit for this? Chess is becoming an unoriginal joke. Maybe Chess 960 is a good alternative, or how about golf? 😛
I have to laugh at all the people decrying the use of computers. Programs are tools, nothing more, and just because some people are too old to accept new technology does not mean that computers are not the superior way to train. Top players today are 10x the players than those of the past BECAUSE they use computer analysis.
I think computers have led to the discovery of new tactical themes, especially in the openings.
These themes may not have the names of the old standards, but they are noticeably different than tactics which appeared in previous decades, IMO.