Help to replace desktop with a laptop to run ChessMaster

[Martin Hudon]

Desktop Win XP AMD Athlon 64 x2 4600+ 2.4 Ghz 2GB ram has finally died.
The only reason I had this machine was to play ChessMaster 9 & 10. Never connected to the internet.

I would like to buy a refurbished Win XP laptop just to play GM 9&10. There are many old win XP refurbished available on ebay,Amazon etc for $200 to 300 dollars.
I am just not sure which laptop processor will be at least equal or preferably better than the Athlon and also run CM.The O.S. must be win XP.

Help would be greatly appreciated. Martin

[Modern Times]

If funds permit another option is to buy a new laptop and run Windows XP in a virtual machine if you have installation media/key for it.

[Vinvin]

For 350 dollars you can get a nice modern dual core with 256 GB SSD.

[Jonathan003]

Why douse it needs to be windows xp?
I have no problems installing Chessmaster 9000 on windows 10 32 bit, (with the latest updates).
There used to be a problem installing and running Chessmaster 9000 on windows 10 32 bit but not anymore.

[Martin Hudon]

Why douse it needs to be windows xp?
I have no problems installing Chessmaster 9000 on windows 10 32 bit, (with the latest updates).
There used to be a problem installing and running Chessmaster 9000 on windows 10 32 bit but not anymore.

I have a windows 10 64 bit intel i7 laptop. The Chessmaster will not install?

[Martin Hudon]

For 350 dollars you can get a nice modern dual core with 256 GB SSD.

With win XP? And will the Chessmaster run on this dual core? And is this dual core equal or better than the Athlon?

[Martin Hudon]

If funds permit another option is to buy a new laptop and run Windows XP in a virtual machine if you have installation media/key for it.

Thanks for your reply.
I have a HP pavilion notebook 15. Win10 with Intel i7 processor. How do I make/install a virtual machine win XP?
This is an area in which I have no expertise at all. Martin

[Jonathan003]

Why douse it needs to be windows xp?
I have no problems installing Chessmaster 9000 on windows 10 32 bit, (with the latest updates).
There used to be a problem installing and running Chessmaster 9000 on windows 10 32 bit but not anymore.

I have a windows 10 64 bit intel i7 laptop. The Chessmaster will not install?

Chessmaster 9000 will not install on a windows 10 64 bit system, but I was able to install it on windows 10 32 bit in VirtualBox without problems. You can even copy the program files and document folders of Chessmaster 9000, in the 32 bit system to the 64 bit system, and run Chessmaster 9000 in Windows 10 64 bit this way.
To run it without problems you have to open Program Complibity Troubleshooter and check the box 'The program requires additional permissions'. I also enabled DirectPlay, and installed the latest patch 1.02a for Chessmaster 9000.

[Martin Hudon]

Why douse it needs to be windows xp?
I have no problems installing Chessmaster 9000 on windows 10 32 bit, (with the latest updates).
There used to be a problem installing and running Chessmaster 9000 on windows 10 32 bit but not anymore.

I have a windows 10 64 bit intel i7 laptop. The Chessmaster will not install?

Chessmaster 9000 will not install on a windows 10 64 bit system, but I was able to install it on windows 10 32 bit in VirtualBox without problems. You can even copy the program files and document folders of Chessmaster 9000, in the 32 bit system to the 64 bit system, and run Chessmaster 9000 in Windows 10 64 bit this way.
To run it without problems you have to open Program Complibity Troubleshooter and check the box 'The program requires additional permissions'. I also enabled DirectPlay, and installed the latest patch 1.02a for Chessmaster 9000.

Thank you for your reply. Martin

[JVMerlino]

Chessmaster 9000 will not install on a windows 10 64 bit system, but I was able to install it on windows 10 32 bit in VirtualBox without problems. You can even copy the program files and document folders of Chessmaster 9000, in the 32 bit system to the 64 bit system, and run Chessmaster 9000 in Windows 10 64 bit this way.
To run it without problems you have to open Program Complibity Troubleshooter and check the box 'The program requires additional permissions'. I also enabled DirectPlay, and installed the latest patch 1.02a for Chessmaster 9000.

Yes, precisely what he said. I'm running CM9000 on my brand new Win 10 64 machine (by copying the files from an old machine) with only a few weird graphical issues due to the changes in how Windows has handled custom interface components since 2004. But it is all completely functional.

I'm also going to finally, after more than 15 years, mention a backdoor that I put in for people who may be still annoyed by the copy protection of requiring the CD every once in a while. These directions are for Windows 10, so some of the key may be slightly different for older versions of Windows.

In regedit:
Computer\HKEY_USERS\S-1-5-21-76881183-1595192616-1402393664-1001\Software\Ubi Soft\Chessmaster 9000

Create a REG_DWORD key called "RelCD" and give it the value x403 (decimal 1027)

That should bypass the CD requirement.

jm