Hi,

next game is an opportunity for me to get the Conic Computer Chess out, as I didn't use it since long. Well, I think I remember why, now...

The issue is not with the playing level; sure it is weak, but I play with a lot of tenderness with any weak chess computer. No, the flaw is this metal jacks system for move detection... Moving the pieces on behalf of the Conic is not an issue, as long as you reach the expected position the computer is happy.

The other way around, which is inputing your player moves, is another story. The device is very sensitive to the way you manipulate the pieces, and is prone to reject your move tentative, displaying blinking LEDs instead of steady ones. And this can happen at any step: when pulling your piece out of the source square, when pulling an ennemy captured piece out, when inserting your piece down in the target square. If so, you need to restore the initial position and retry the move from scratch.

Sometimes it can fail several times in a row... thus move, move back, move, move back, retry... The worst case is castling. You need to successfully pull your King and get a steady LED. Then insert the King in its new square, woops, blinking LEDs. Set the King back in initial place. Pull the King. Blinking LED, not good. Re-insert the King. Pull it, by chance the LED is steady, insert it in the new square, great !! Second steady LED! Now pull the Rook out... Sh*t, three blinking LEDs... restart from scratch . Long story made short, you need a bit of luck to achieve the castling move with four steady LEDs, now you can press Enter to let the computer move.

Well, after playing a couple of games, you should have developed some training and technics increasing the chances for successful move detection: be straight and fast, but not too fast; let the piece fall freely in the location then apply a clean vertical fast push down from above, if this doesn't work insert only a couple millimeters, make sure the LED is steady, and once this occurs, complete the push down of the piece...

The good news is, despite the hassle, one can play full games assuming a bit of patience. And games were not that long, as the opponent is this round is the Fidelity Electronics Excellence (3 Mhz). 600 CElo points difference is more than enough to shorten the games to around twenty moves ...



MfG,
Tibono