ChessBase allows you to use chess engine / engines when working with chess games - ChessBase calls them Kibitzer. For any move or position you can call the Kibitzer, which will evaluate the position, suggest a good or interesting continuation, or analyze the chess game noting the good and weak moves, suggesting what to play.
The longer the chess engine works, the more confident we can be in its evaluation. ChessBase allows you to install multiple chess engines and use one or more of them simultaneously.
ChessBase allow access to millions of already proven positions by other chess players using the Kibitzer.
If you find yourself in an interesting position and turn on the Kibitzer, you can immediately see the results that other chess players have obtained in the same position using different chess engines, The result is astounding. You can now quickly go through the key lines, observing not only what moves made, but also what the different Kibitzer - chess engines - calculated.
ChessBase has compiled all these Kibitzer evaluations into a separate book of openings called the Live Book. The result is a lively, fast-moving environment that helps chess players in their analysis, position evaluations which enables faster and more effective preparation for opponents and promotes learning and rapid progress in the art of chess.
This is part 4 of a 5 part course on the ChessBase program.
Suitable for ChessBase 12 or later.
Depending on the version of ChessBase you are using dear reader, your program includes one to several Kibitzers that are integrated into ChessBase.
The very good news is that...
Each of the pre-built Kibitzers plays with a strength that surpasses even the playing strength of a World Chess Champion!
This means, that the results of position analysis and evaluation using any of the Kibitzers will be objective and at a very, very high level.
You can install additional engines, you can set the default engine as any of the installed ones, you can even rent some really powerful Kibitzers in the cloud.
How to use chess engines with ChessBase - that's what this part of the course is about.
Kibitzer
In the rest of this course, I will use the name: Kibitzer instead of chess engine.
To see a list of installed Kibitzers: - Open a any game and go to Home - Add Kibitzer
As you can see, I have added several additional Kibitzers to my list of chess engines.
Install Kibitzer
You can install any chess engine in ChessBase that uses the UCI (Universal Chess Interface) protocol.
Almost all modern, free and commercial chess engines support the UCI protocol.
To install new Kibitzers, download them, open any game or empty chessboard and click Home - Create UCI Engine.
A new window will open: Set up UCI Engine.
Click "..." button.
And in the next window indicate the chess engine to install. In this case it will be Colossus v2008b.exe.
Click on the Open button.
Note that ChessBase recognized the engine name: Colossus 2008b and its author: Martin Bryant.
To install the selected chess engine, click on the OK button.
UCI engines can be used wherever they are, in any folder or any disk on the computer. The configuration files with the extension *.uci are always saved in the folder / Documents and Settings/Username/Application Data/ChessBase/Engines.UCI.
When you install new ChessBase programs (such as Fritz), the built-in chess engines are automatically placed in the Engines directory.
Once the chess engine has been installed correctly, it will be visible in the list of available Kibitzers.
Kibitzers (engines) management
If you have installed a lot of Kibitzers and would like only selected Kibitzers to be listed, go to Home - Engine Management.
After moving the selected Kibitzers from the left side ( Active engines ) to the right side ( Inactive engines ), confirm your choice by clicking on OK button.
Again by clicking on Home - Add Kibitzer, my list contains only selected Kibitzers ( Active engines ).
Of course, inactive Kibitzers (they are installed) can be activated in the same way as described above by clicking on Home - Engine Management.
After activating two Kibitzers named:
Colossus 2008b
Fritz 15
My Kibitzers list looks exactly like this:
Default Kibitzer
Let's open any chess game.
There is always one selected default Kibitzer in ChessBase, which can be started by clicking on the Home - Default Kibitzer ribbon.
The default Kibitzer can be set by entering the main options - Click on the key icon.
The Options window will open.
After click on Engines, you will see options on the right side of the window for setting the default chess engine.
To make a change to the default Kibitzer, click Browse...
A familiar window with a list of chess engines will open.
After selecting another default Kibitzer from the available chess engines, confirm with OK button.
As we can see, the default Kibitzer ( Default Engine ) has been changed to Fritz 17, which we selected in the previous window.
The default Kibitzer should be the chess engine that is best / most used for you.
After clicking the OK button, we will return to the window with the chess game opened earlier.
So let's check if our new default Kibitzer will work after launch.
Oh yes, it works !
A chess engine called Fritz, which comes with ChessBase, provides perfect integration with all ChessBase options and capabilities.
There are different versions of the Fritz chess engine.
One of the most powerful is Fritz 17 released by ChessBase in 2019 (author Frank Schneider) , whose chess playing power has been measured at the sky-high level of 3190 Elo points ( rapid time control ).
By comparison, the playing strength of World Chess Champion Magnus Carlsen in December 2021 was 2842 Elo points ( rapid time control ), which is 348 Elo points less than the Fritz 17 Kibitzer!
Click on this link - if you want to learn more about the Elo ranking system.
Working with Kibitzer / Kibitzers
As you may have guessed, working with Kibitzer-who can play chess with a strength far superior to that of any human player - produces very good results. And this is indeed the case.
With a game board, open the default Kibitzer or select another Kibitzer: Home - Add Kibitzer and double-click on your engine choice.
You can add several different Kibitzers if you wish.
For example, let's add a second Kibitzer.
As we can see, two chess engines ( Fritz 17 and Stockfish 14 ) simultaneously analyze the initial position of a chess game.
If you have more than one Kibitzer running, you can remove the last one loaded with Home - Remove kibitzer.
The more Kibitzers you add, the more impact it will have on your computer's resources.
In 1994 a set of chessboard positions was created to test the chess engines of the time.
One of the positions was then briefly summarized by Mr. Bruce Moreland, who stated: "I don't think that anyone ( chess engine) has ever solved this one."
Here's that position:
r2qk2r/ppp1b1pp/2n1p3/3pP1n1/3P2b1/2PB1NN1/PP4PP/R1BQK2R w - - 0 1
I will show you how powerful is modern chess engine.... Let's start Fritz 17 Kibitzer :-)
After... 6 seconds I get result:
Just 6 seconds after running Fritz 17 Kibitzer, we got the result of the analysis - the strongest move Nxg5 in that position was found.
After adding the next two top lines of analysis, we see that the Nxg5 move is by far the strongest continuation.
To increase or decrease the number of lines to be examined by Kibitzer, click on the magnifying glass with + or -.
Twenty-five years after this position was published, the unsolvable task was solved in... 6 seconds !
I would like to emphasize that the quality of position and game analysis by chess engines has increased incredibly over the last quarter of a century.
It is worth using the suggestions of modern chess Kibitzers like Fritz 17, as they are able to quickly, efficiently and accurately offer any chess player objective and accurate suggestions, continuation plans, finding errors and inaccuracies or analysis of chess games.
Important Notes...
When you open a Kibitzer, it will not be available for use in a position in another game until you close it in the game where it is used.
If you don't see Kibitzer in the list of available engines, it means you left it active in another window.
If you cannot open Kibitzer, you probably have so many ChessBase windows open that the program no longer has enough resources (e.g. ram memory) to load the chess engine. You should close some windows or other programs.
You can block Kibitzer to explore other parts of the game or a completely different game: right-click on the engine panel - Block Engine. If you do not lock the engine, its results will be lost when you click elsewhere in the game, because Kibitzer will otherwise assume that you are interested in evaluating movement in a new game location.
Understanding the result of Kibitzer's work
As you may remember, in the content of this course above - I opened Fritz 17 to analyze a position that 25 years had been considered unsolvable for chess engines.
Let's recall what was shown.
The result of Fritz 17's work was revealed in a window called Kibitzer: Fritz 17 Popcnt and included:
Position evaluation: 1.35
Search depth: 24
Best move analyzed: Nxg5
The number of positions checked per second: 374 kN/s
Continuation of moves after the best found move: 1.Nxg5 Bxd1 2.Nxe6 Qc8 3.Nxg7+ etc.
Detailed description: this is what the engine window displays:
Top line from left to right:
Engine name; the move currently under investigation (number x of y legal move); stop engine; increase (+) or decrease (–) the number of variations calculated simultaneously.
Second line from left to right
Fail high/fail low display; position evaluation in pawns (+ is good for White, – good for Black); search depth (full width/selective); time used on current search; number of positions per second (in thousands).
Functions in the engine window
Right-clicking the variation window produces a function menu for the analysis engine.
Engine: Selects an analysis engine.
Lock: Normally the engine follows the board notation. But you can lock it to a specific position, after which it will ignore what happens on the board.
Increase/Decrease number of lines: You can instruct the engine to calculate the n best lines in the position.
Next best: This is only supported by some engines (e.g. Fritz). The engine ignores the best move found so far and uses its full power to search for an alternative (the next best move).
Threat: Calculates the "threat" in the current position.
Clip analysis: Copies the entire analysis history into the Windows clipboard. It can be pasted into any text editor.
Copy to notation: Copies the best line found so far into the game notation (Ctrl-Space).
Scroll main line: New lines are added to the end of the list. If this is switched off, new lines overwrite the previous ones.
Extra search information: Records evaluation, search depth and number of positions after each main line.
Scroll new moves only: New lines are recorded only if the first move changes.
Variation board: Produces on a small board on which you can replay the main line.
Choose font: Select font and size for the the analysis display.
Properties: Allows you to set the engine parameters.
The engine parameters influence the analysis style of the engines.
For example, hash tables are memory areas in which the program can store positions and evaluations while it is calculating the moves of a game. If the program encounters the same position again, it can simply take the evaluation from the hash tables, rather than analyzing the position all over again. Hash tables increase the playing strength of the program considerably.
For slower time controls and deep analysis the engines need large hash tables, eg. 512MB and more.
Close: Closes the window and shuts down the engine.
Chess engines evaluate positions with the help of a numeric value.
The evaluation is expressed in pawn units, always from the point of view of White.
Piece Value in pawn units
Pawn 1.0
Knight 3.0
Bishop 3.0
Rook 5.0
Queen 9.0
If the program is displaying a value of +1.30, this means that it considers the white position to be better by the equivalent of 1.3 pawns.
If White is actually a pawn up, then the additional 0.3 is the result of positional considerations (mobility, deployment of pieces, king safety, pawn structure, etc.).
A display of –3.00 means that White is a piece down – either a bishop or a knight, which are both equivalent to about three pawns. Rooks are worth five and the queen about nine pawns. Of course the king's value is unlimited – lose it and you've lost the game.
Always it is the case: positive values favour White, negative values favour Black.
In addition to the precise pawn values, the evaluation is also given in standard chess symbols:
To show how Kibitzer "thinks" when it analyzes a position, let's use the setting on the board according to the image below.
Fen notation:
r2qk2r/ppp1b1pp/2n1p3/3pP1N1/3P4/2PB2N1/PP4PP/R1BbK2R w KQkq - 0 2
2.Nxe6 Qb8 3.Nxg7+ Kf8 4.Ne6+ Kf7 5.Nf4 Bg4 6.Nxd5 Ke8 7.0-0 Rf8 8.Rxf8+ Kxf8 9.Bxh7 Be6 10.Nf4
Black is better: -/+ (-0.99) Depth: 10 00:00:00
2.Nxe6 Qb8 3.Nxg7+ Kf8 4.Ne6+ Kf7 5.Nf4 Bg4 6.0-0 Kg7 7.Nf5+ Bxf5 8.Nh5+ Kf7 9.Bxf5 Ke8 10.Ng7+ Kf8 11.Ne6+ Kg8 12.Nf4
Black is slightly better: =/+ (-0.69 ++) Depth: 14 00:00:00 531kN
2.Nxe6 Qc8 3.Nxg7+
The position is equal: = (0.05 ++) Depth: 17 00:00:01 1942kN
2.Nxe6 Qc8 3.Nxg7+ Kf7 4.Bh6 Bg4 5.0-0+ Kg8 6.Rf4 Nxe5 7.N3f5 Bc5 8.dxc5 Qf8 9.Ne6 Qf6 10.Re1 Bxf5 11.Bxf5 Qxh6 12.Rxe5 c6 13.Re2
White is slightly better: +/= (0.60) Depth: 17 00:00:01 3477kN
2.Nxe6 Qc8 3.Nxg7+ Kf7 4.Bh6 Bg4 5.0-0+ Kg8 6.Rf4 Nxe5 7.N3f5 Bc5 8.dxc5 Qf8 9.Ne6 Qf6 10.Re1 Bxf5 11.Bxf5 Qxh6 12.Rxe5 c6 13.Re2
White is better: +/- (0.92 ++) Depth: 18 00:00:01 4942kN
2.Nxe6 Qb8 3.Nxg7+ Kd8 4.Kxd1 b5 5.Bf5 Na5 6.Rf1 b4 7.Ne6+ Ke8 8.cxb4 Bxb4 9.Ng7+ Kd8 10.Bg4 Be7 11.Rf7 Nc6 12.N3f5 Qb4 13.Ne6+ Kc8 14.Nf4
White is clearly better: +- (1.81 ++) Depth: 22 00:00:09 36408kN
It is worth noting, the change in Kibitzer's evaluation of the position over time and with the increasing depth of the search for the best move and continuation.
The longer Kibitzer analyzes and the deeper he searches, the more accurate his evaluation of the position becomes.
Threat in position
You can use the Kibitzer to find the threat in any position.
After open the Kibitzer (do not lock it) and right-click in the engine and select Analyze threat or press X key.
The Kibitzer will now shift ahead a half ply and it start analyzing the position.
The result is a list of the possible threats in the position. There might well be more than one threat, and so make sure that the Kibitzer is analyzing more than one line at a time.
In our example, Kibitzer analyzes three lines.
As the Kibitzer chugs away on a position, there will be times when you know that its top choice is wrong. That can be useless, because the Kibitzer will be wasting time on a line that you have already rejected. In that case, right-dick It Next Best or press the Y key to force the Kibitzer to start its analysis with the next best line, excluding the main line from looking for a threat.
Variation board
You can watch the positions of the Kibitzer's analysis on the additional chess board. Right-click within the Kibitzer's analysis pane and click Variation Board.
To the right of the Kibitzer analysis window, the Variation board will appear.
Don't forget to click on the button marked with a red border on the variation board, this setting on the chess board will automatically update.
After some time and analyzing the position more deeply, the setting on the additional chess board was updated.
Clip analysis
You can insert the main line or all lines being analyzed directly into the game notation by right-clicking in the analysis pane, and then selecting Copy to Notation or Copy all to notation.
Example:
When you click Copy to Notation, the analysis line is inserted into the notation and preceded by the name of the chess engine (Fritz 17 Popcnt).
1.70 is the position score and 25 is the depth at which Kibitzer analyzed.
You can also copy the Kibitzer analysis result directly to the clipboard. To do this right-click to Kibitzer pane and click Clip analysis.
When you paste the contents of the clipboard into Notepad or another text editor, you get:
The first line is a record of the position setting on the board in Fen notation
On the second line is the name of the Kibitzer that did the analysis.
In the third line is the chess notation of the analyzed line along with the position evaluation, the depth of the search, the number of chess positions analyzed (103M).
The more lines at a time Kibitzer analyzes, the less accurate the result of the analysis will be than if Kibitzer analyzes only one line - I recommend especially such to correspondence chess players.
The greater number of lines at once analyzed by Kibitzer allows for more insight into the chess player's evaluation of the position - I recommend this to chess players who want quick analysis results for several possible continuations - not necessarily the strongest.
Let's Check
It is worth waiting some time until the engine reaches sufficient depth to offer a useful analysis result.
In popular lines, many players often analyze the same positions, which is an inefficient waste of time and computing power.
ChessBase has a useful Let's Check feature, a way to save and share analysis results.
To use this feature, select Lets Check from the Analysis ribbon.
Lets check the analysis of other players in the interesting opening that is the king's gambit:
As we can see, the eighth move was once analyzed by three Kibitzers: Stockfish 14, Komodo 13.2, and Deep Fritz 14. It is worth noting, that Kibitzer Stockfish 14 analyzed this position deepest to depth 33, meaning that his choice of move 8.Bb5+ is probably the most accurate and strongest.
Being at move nine, we see that only one Kibitzer has previously analyzed this position: Komodo 14.
Note, that after some time when you, dear reader, analyze positions using Lets Check, the result of your Kibitzer's analysis will also be recorded - similar to mine in this position - first line (sedarpl)
I recommend using Lets Check
You can find out the analysis results of other Kibitzers instantly, without having to wait and spend your time and electricity for hours.
Let's check does not favor some engines over others.
Let's check suggests more of the longest and deepest analyses assuming that they will show the most accurate results.
Your analysis can supply Lets Check :-)
As you may have noticed, by sharing analysis, everyone on ChessBase (who uses Lets check) can benefit.
If you would like to join this excellent group of users, then after starting Let's Check, click on Settings. Enter your PlayChess username and password, then click OK button.
When you connect to Let's check using the account you are using on the PlayChess, you will be able to send positions and chess games to the Let's check server.
If you want to disable this, in the Lets check window, click on Settings and select Disconnect.
Worth knowing: You will not be able to participate in these activities without having a Playchess account.
Let's Check Analysis
Chess players review their important and interesting chess games as well as strong and famous players as part of their chess passion, while studying, or just for fun.
Let's Let's Check automate this process!
With the game open, launch a Kibitzer and Let's Check, and then Analysis - Let's Check Analysis.
And in the newly opened window, we see four main types of analysis.
Blunders, Combinations, Training includes a useful summary of turning points in the game.
Here is a game analysis of the chess game between Anatoly Karpov vs Garry Kasparov played in the World Championship 32nd-KK2 in 1985.
After a short while we get the analyzed chess game with annotations.
As we can see, serious errors occurred on both sides, but the decisive error for White was 40.e5??, which Garry Kasparov precisely exploited and in three moves made Anatoly Karpov resign.
Lets Check Analysis is an extremely effective way to watch and study chess games.
The Retrieval Only option shows a list of major alternatives when players chose moves that were not at the top of the Let's Check recommendation list.
The analysis starts when a game deviates from the established debut theory.
Again, Lets Check delivers results very quickly and you don't need a super fast computer to get this data.
Standard analysis provides a summary of available Let's check results usually in three or two variations.
Below is an extract of the notation along with an analysis.
Win variations calculates until at least one variation has been won.
If you use Win variations to analyze your chess games, historical games or games that have just been played - it is possible that you will "discover" new positions and interesting continuations.
It is worth remembering, that after an important live match, deep analysis is probably already available for the entire game. Just a few clicks in your ChessBase using Let's Check :-)
With Let's Check, without having to buy an expensive computer or spend your time, you can get a very quick, objective overview of the chess games that interest you.
Tablebase
There are a total of 64 pieces on the chessboard in the starting position. The total number of possible moves is so unimaginably large that chess will remain an unsolvable game for a very, very long time.
But... during each game the number of pieces and pawns decreases with time due to the players' moves, and one by one they disappear from the chessboard.
After a certain number of moves, it is not uncommon for the situation on the chessboard to go into the so-called endgame phase.
In a situation where e.g. a few pieces remain on the board, is it possible to use solutions that will help Kibitzer to analyze chess positions even more accurately?
Yes! The answer is Tablebase.
For us ChessBase users, it is important to know and take advantage of this knowledge that the cooperation between chess engine and Tablebase significantly increases Kibitzer ability to deliver accurate results in endgames.
Kibitzer using Tablebase will be even faster and more accurate - catching transitions to winning continuations in endgames, typically providing, for example, the exact line of the continuation and the number of moves to mate the opponent or achieve the desired draw.
The concept of using a Tablebase is not new, so over the last few years with the development of computers and the increase in computing power, several Tablebases with different capabilities have emerged.
In ChessBase, after entering the Settings - selecting Tablebases - Edit..,
The Tablebases window opens.
ChessBase can use various Tablebases:
Nalimov
Syzygy
Gaviota.
So which Tablebase should I choose ?
I recommend using Syzygy Tablebase.
If you are interested in the details between the different Tablebases, I recommend the excellent article on the ChessBase website; one example: a big advantage of the Syzygy Endgame Tablebases is that they are much smaller than others Tablebases. The 6-man Syzygy tablebases need 150 GB disc space, whereas the Nalimov tablebases need more than 1 TB.
To start enjoying the benefits of Kibitzer working with Syzygy Tablebase, that tablebase must be accessible to ChessBase and correctly configured in the settings.
There are several ways to integrate the TableBase results into ChessBase kibitzers.
All of the above Tablebases are legally available for free and downloadable from the Internet.
If you want to make the process of getting Tablebase its installation and configuration as simple as possible, then ChessBase offers to buy a ready-made kit that, once installed, will do the job in a few clicks.
Click to image to visit ChessBase shop.
You can also manually point ChessBase to the path to Syzygy Tablebase.
An example is shown in the image below.
Due to the size of the Tablebase, I recommend installing them outside the Documents folder, for example in D:\syzygy
After entering the settings and clicking OK, Syzygy Tablebase will be prepared to work with a modern Kibitzer such as Fritz 17.
You can check whether the access is working by looking at the output of a chess engine.
I suggest to first create a position on the chessboard consisting of e.g. 4 pieces (White King, White Queen, Black King, Black Rook) and then open the Fritz chess engine.
In this example you can see entries like tb= 281, which show how often the chess engine is accessing the endgame Syzygy tablebase.
If you are not seeing tb=xxx entries, there are several possible causes:
Syzygy Tablebase was entered incorrectly in Settings - most common cause.
The position on the chessboard contains too many pieces, and Syzygy Tablebase does not have the required data.
Kibitzer - the chess engine - can't work with Syzygy Tablebase. This happens when you open an old Kibitzer published e.g. in 2000.
ChessBase has incorporated some items from TableBases into the Let's Check analysis results.
This means, that if you reach a position that exists in Let's Check, you will immediately get insight into it using the analysis result.
You can certainly use Syzygy TableBase as a tool to learn and develop your chess skills, such as quickly matting your opponent's King using the Knight and Bishop with your King support.
LiveBook
LiveBook is the largest source of information on openings that have already been played. ChessBase collects data from Let's Check in LiveBook, a huge and very fast-growing book of openings. LiveBook is ready to use, right from the cloud - all you need is ChessBase and Internet access.
By browsing chess openings and gambit continuations internally, you can get to know all the lines very quickly. Thousands of computers and chess engines all over the world are analyzing variants, gambits, correspondence and master games at any time and adding the results to this cloud database LiveBook!
ChessBase together with LiveBook is a powerful tool for every chess player, which offers the best continuations resulting from group work :-))
LiveBook is "live" because it can change from second to second. Every position that is checked in LiveBook is immediately available with a evaluation / position score.
LiveBook "forgets" the information that is irrelevant and rarely used, and leaves the information that is most useful.
Here is a chess game between Grischuk Alexander and Carlsen Magnus played at the 2007 Wch Blitz tournament.
In the Notation + Opening Book pane, press the LiveBook tab indicated by the red line.
