Author: Steen Suurballe (Chess program)
& Dan Wulff (Opening book)
Homepage: Steen
Suurballe
Gambit-Soft
Download: Commercial program
available at Gambit Soft (Price 59,-- DM, available
approx. on the 15.09.2000) !
Estimate of playing strength: 2650 ELO TOP Tip:
(Strongest available "WinBoard
Engine")
Necessary addition(s) to WinBoard.ini:
\"Gandalf_432h xboard\"
/fd=c:\\WinBoard\\Gandalf
\"Gandalf_432h xboard\" /sd=c:\\WinBoard\\Gandalf
Configuration: Gandalf.res
The various
configuration possibilities are explained in the readme
files. Anyone interested can download the readme webpage.zip.
The important options can be configured easily, ie.
hashtable size, tablebasepath, resign parameters and so
on.
Features:
Under the WinBoard Menu Help /
Book it's possible, as with a few other
WinBoard Engines, to display the possible bookmoves
available for guidance in a particular (opening) position.
Gandalf masters all WinBoard options and can be used
without problems with most commercially available
products.
Impression:
Steen Suurballe has been involved in chess programming
for the last 15 years and the program Gandalf has been
under steady development for 9 years. This year Steen has
invested a lot of time in improving his program and he
seems to have accomplished just that. I got involved as a
betatester a short time ago and knew very little of the
program beforehand. After spending several hours in its
company I'm very impressed with its performance.
Especially the, in my opinion, agressive positional
playing style is joyous to behold. That, I imagine, is
due to the addition of large amounts of chess knowledge.
This is also reflected in the speed of the program.
Gandalf is not among the fastest searchers, so don't
expect a large nps count. But it's definately a more
"intelligent" program. As Frank, I won't
hesitate rating Gandalf as the strongest WinBoard
compatible program available. What more can I add? It's
danish design.
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