Hiarcs Chess Explorer Pro - Coming Soon! (Now Released)

[Gabor Szots]

Chess enthusiasts are only interested in LC0, NNUE networks, Stockfish engine and especially how much stronger newer versions are. That's all they care about.

In my opinion you are very wrong here. Most chess enthusiasts do not care about strength, they enjoy all engines.

[criko]

Have you or I been asked??

But ok, I'm getting off here. I am sure that I am not alone in my opinion. Others just don't dare to say it.

Bye!

He's doing mimimi again and again

Why are you provoking me without saying anything on the subject? Poor men!

You are a Profile neurotics ... you only need a stage to show up.
Shall I post the games you lost against me?

[Eduard]

The point is that someone here is claiming the engine is just a bonus. I would only like to have this bonus, the more important part of the package should be bought by people who think the GUI is fantastic and great.

The 'point' is...for $79.95 USD, you can have it...."to test" or relive "a little nostalgia" if those things matter that much to you. The same goes with Dragon 2.6 which is roughly the same price as I recall and for just the engine. Did you pony up for that?

You have already expressed your 'preference' to donate to open source projects (free stuff). That is where your joy lies, so...perhaps you should just go with that and just stop whining, okay?

I write that I am ONLY interested in the pure engine, ok! I'm not interested in the package. I have no use for Hiarcs Explorer. I work with other tools.

I lack a reasonable justification for not being able to buy a pure engine that I used to love (I also have older Hiarcs versions).

And you tell me to buy the expensive package (bla bla).

But I won't moan, I promise.

I am very disappointed with Mark Uniacke.

I understand your request now. I understand that you don't want to pay that much money for a chess engine when you don't need to use the Hiarcs Chess Explorer database software.

There is a user on the official forum who had the individual opportunity to purchase the Deep Hiarcs 14 chess engine. Officially, the Hiarcs 14 chess engine was not sold separately. Hiarcs 14 was also included in Hiarcs Chess Explorer 1.x database software. It is therefore likely that if the user contacts Mark on an official email, he will be able to buy a new chess engine at a much lower price.

I will not ask for a special engine version. I understand that many people like to use the Hiarcs Explorer under Apple software. Apple software is good, but too expensive for me. If you use Apple for you, the price for the Hiarcs Explorer is OK. I use Windows, and since version 1 the ChessBase program. I am very satisfied with it because all UCI engines can be integrated. I cannot confirm the criticism that ChessBase is slow. I use databases with many millions of games (Mega Database commented on in detail). With the search accelerator set up, everything can be found very quickly, players, openings, mate, stalemate, figure stays, material difference, endgames, etc .. !!

Nevertheless, I wish all users of Hiarcs Explorer a lot of fun with it.

I'm not interested in all kinds of engines. But I am in the scene from the first DOS version and have acquired all of these engines: ChessGenius, Shredder, Hiarcs, Fritz, MChess, Zarkov etc.

So I'm sorry to have to go without H15, but OK.

I took a break from computer chess from 2012 to 2017 (played myself). I reawakened my love for engines in 2017 and fondly remember the good old time!

I'll try to explain why Mark doesn't sell the chess engine on his own. Most people prefer the most powerful Stockfish chess engine, which has been evolving for several years, and many people lend their hardware to test new versions of the chess engine. Stockfish is free. LC0 is free. Can the Hiarcs engine be sold for money? Definitely yes. Will people be willing to buy a stand-alone chess engine for the same price as the Komodo Dragon chess engine? Certainly not.

Komodo Dragon engine is the only exception in the world of computer chess. Komodo is a very powerful chess engine that offers interesting features and tries to bring something new to computer chess (MCTS, better multi PV analysis, experimental NNUE network). There are many chess enthusiasts and professional players who buy a powerful Dragon chess engine. If Hiarcs is a few hundred ELO weaker, then no one will want to pay $75 for a weaker chess engine.

Mark focuses mainly on chess database software and the Hiarcs engine is optimized mainly for game style, simulation of human chess on lower levels of difficulty and analysis of chess games. The chess engine does not try to be the most powerful chess engine in the world. Most chess engine enthusiasts only want the most powerful chess engines. Chess enthusiasts are only interested in LC0, NNUE networks, Stockfish engine and especially how much stronger newer versions are. That's all they care about. The Hiarcs engine focuses on other aspects that computer chess enthusiasts are not interested in.

OK, thanks for that explanation. Finally a reasonable answer here! Yes, I can understand why people are buying HIARCS Explorer. I prefer ChessBase, and it's good that we're different. If I had Apple, I might buy HIARCS too. But I have Windows. ChessBase runs great on it. I only paid 89 euros for the CB 16 (there is a discount twice a year). So I don't see any point in buying HIARCS 15 as well.

About the prices (in Germany I also have to pay 19% more):

Here is a package for 69 euros + 19%:

GM 2022 online book
(3 million positions)
✓
Single Core Performance
✗
1000GB online endgame tablebases

The first is out of the question because I want the MP version.

Here is a package for 99 euros + 19%:

GM+ 2022 online book
(12 million positions)
✓
Multi-core Performance - up to 16 cores
✓
1000GB online endgame tablebases

The package costs 30 Euro more because it's H15 MP version. I myself have so many databases OFFLINE (not online). I can download all syzygy for free, which is what I did. I've been collecting games databases for 30 years! I don't need any of that.

As I said, I don't need the GUI either. In this respect, HIARCS 15 Single-Engine costs me 69 euros + 19%
The desired MP version then costs me a total of 119 EURO.

You are correct when you say that nobody wants to pay as much as they do for Komodo Dragon.

I love classic chess engines (the new ones are all based on Stockfish, Glaurung or other open source, I'm not interested in that!).

119 euros are too much for me, I'm sorry. For 50 euros pure engine I would buy Hiarcs 15 MP straight away - as a lover.

Mark is obviously not interested in older fans, or he wants them to pay more. Sad.

[mclane]

Either you like how Hiarcs plays or not.
If you like it, you can buy it. If not, don't do it. I don’t understand this discussion. Hiarcs is one of the last unique evaluation engines.
Mark began programming hiarcs as an hommage to marty bryants mchess.

Without mchess, hiarcs cannot be thought.
Within a few versions (!) hiarcs showed its strength and won the amateur title in munich on the championship.

Either you like hiarcs or not.

I would like to see hiarcs being put into a dedicated chess computer. We were very close in munich that this could have happened. Both hiarcs and the spracklen sparc modul used the sun sparc cpu.

But mr. Winkler did not eant to invest the mobey a title program would have deserved.

[mclane]

Either you like how Hiarcs plays or not.
If you like it, you can buy it. If not, don't do it. I don’t understand this discussion. Hiarcs is one of the last unique evaluation engines.
Mark began programming hiarcs as an hommage to marty hirschs mchess.

Without mchess, hiarcs cannot be thought.
Within a few versions (!) hiarcs showed its strength and won the amateur title in munich on the championship.

Either you like hiarcs or not.

I would like to see hiarcs being put into a dedicated chess computer. We were very close in munich that this could have happened. Both hiarcs and the spracklen sparc modul used the sun sparc cpu.

But mr. Winkler did not eant to invest the mobey a title program would have deserved.

[emadsen]

I write that I am ONLY interested in the pure engine, ok! I'm not interested in the package. I have no use for Hiarcs Explorer. I work with other tools.

I lack a reasonable justification for not being able to buy a pure engine that I used to love (I also have older Hiarcs versions).

I understand your point of view now, Eduard. You'd like an option to buy only the Hiarcs 15 engine, at a reduced price, and not the HCE Pro GUI. That is clear now. However, I think you brought this on yourself by saying:

I always see myself as a potential buyer. And honestly feel ripped off. 150 euros plus VAT for an engine is simply bold.

That's incorrect. The price is for a GUI + an engine. It took you awhile to acknowledge this. It would have been more direct simply to say you prefer an engine-only option. Or better yet, contact the Hiarcs team directly and ask if they're willing to sell the engine separately rather than derailing this thread which is supposed to be about the HCE Pro GUI.

Ultimately, the decision to sell GUIs and engines as a bundle or separately belongs to Mark Uniacke and his company, same as it does for ChessBase and other companies. I'm pretty certain ChessBase made the same decision as Mark: bundle only.

[emadsen]

Erik, it is also a playing software, but I like the levels. If the publishing capabilities are good, I will thinking seriously about buying it.

BTW, had another look at your blog. I hope you'll continue to develop MadChess. And the killing move was d1S+, forking the queen.

Best wishes!

Yes, HCE Pro is a very good GUI for sparring with engines. I used it last night to play some games against my engine at reduced strength. HCE Pro has great support for UCI_LimitStrength + UCI_Elo. I'm glad HCE Pro supports opening books in human-versus-engine mode. The regular HCE didn't- it only supported starting from specific opening positions or relying on an engine's internal book. My engine doesn't have an internal book so this was an annoyance.

Regarding the last position / puzzle I posted on my blog... yes, you are correct. Cool under-promotion! I am a patzer player. I intend to play more this year, on chess.com and using HCE Pro.

I do work on MadChess when I have time. Hopefully I can improve the evaluation a bit and release a new version in the spring.

[Rubinus]

I don't care about the GUI and the engine is supposedly crushed from a $20 engine... Well for that price separately, or double that for yearly updates I would hopefully still buy it. Probably not that way, too expensive.

[mclane]

So far it does not look like hiarcs is crushed very easily.

[BrendanJNorman]

I heard a quote when I was younger that completely changed my self-pitying worldview and motivated me to take earning money seriously:

"NOTHING is too expensive. It's just that YOU can't afford it."

This guy clearly *wants* Hiarcs, but can't justify the price.

This is an earning problem, not a "too expensive" problem.

Others spend thousands on t-shirts.

2 cents and so on...

Me myself, I can't wait to get my hands on Hiarcs AND to test the new HCE features.