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| Title: Chess
Informant 81 |
Author: Chess
Informant |
Language:  |
Pages: 347 |
| Cover:
Paperback |
Published: 2001 |
| Publisher:
Chess Informant |
Homepage: http://www.sahovski.com/ |
| Price: £
18,00 - Book+CD: £ 22,00 |
ISSN: 0351
1375 |
| Reviewed by: Søren
Søgaard |
Date: 30/8 2001 |
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A new edition of Chess Informant has been published, and what can
you say about a product that now has reach volume 81? It is not easy
to write a review about a subject that has been around for so long
;-) Anyway, let's start with a look at the content of this new
volume
that you can buy either as a book or the new electronic edition. But
before that I have to mention that in my opinion the readership are
players with ELO>2100. Not that it is waste of money if your ELO
is a bit lower(!), but there are a lot of great books that maybe will suite you better.
The Book
The main thing in Chess Informator is of course the annotated
games, and
this edition contains 490 games. If you also counts the games in
the notes the total number is about 900 games. The games is mostly
annotated by International Masters and Grandmasters, including 9
games annotated by Kasparov, 10 games by Kramnik and 3 games by
Anand. Most of the best players in the world contributes to Chess
Informant, and this is one of the great strength of this product. By
the way the annotators comes from none less than 41 different
countries!
Content:
- "The best ten games" and "The ten most
important novelties"
- Theory of the most important novelty
- 490 annotated games
- 18 Combinations
- 18 Endgames
- Tournaments
- The Best of Vladimir Kramnik
- Indexes
The first part containing the best games is of high quality, but personally I could do without the
combinations and the Endgames at the end of the book. The reason why I buy this book is
because of the development in the opening! If Chess Informant really want to fill
out some pages, I would rather like some more statistics about the
openings.
It is remarkably that "The best game" and "The
most important novelty" is the same in this volume! The
"winner" was Kramnik's game against Kasparov from there
match in London, and the position below is where Kramnik found a new
move. The move played looks more natural to me than the old move
11.Rb3, but on the other hand I'm no Grandmaster....
Kramnik - Kasparov
WC, London 2000
In this position Kramnik found the novelty 11.Rb7! and
later won a fine game. This game was very important for the result
of the match, and as we all know Kramnik won after a tough fight.
At the end of the book there is a selection of Kramnik's best
games and statistics about his results with white and black. A nice
tip: If you are going to play Kramnik with the White pieces try to
make him play the opening "C4", here he only scores +0 =22 -4. If you can do that,
you are on the best way of at least a draw ;-)
CD-ROM
If you buy the electronic version you get a total amount of 978
games that can be viewed in Chess Informant's own "Chess
Informant Reader". A new edition (1.9) of this reader is
also included on the CD-ROM and there are a few new features
in this new edition:
- Chess Engine Crafty built-in: As with other software products it
is also possible to use Crafty to analyze a position. You can
also play against Crafty, but I have to warn you - The layout is
not the best, and Crafty is by no means a new Fritz!
- Print: It is possible to print any game, ECO line or
combination. I still miss that I can't save the game in pgn
or other formats. I also had some difficulties to find the
"...configurable printout" as mentioned at the
cover of this product. In fact I couldn't find it at all!!
- Chess-quiz: A feature you also can see in other
electronic products. It is now possible to solve examples from
"Anthology of Chess Combinations" in Chess Informant
Reader. I had to admit that I used better products than this, and I think that
they have to improve this feature in the future. Below you can
see a screenshot of this new "Chess-quiz".
All in all this new Chess Informant Reader has made some nice
improvements, but I still think that there is much that could be
improved in future editions.
Also included at the CD is a free supplement of "ECO Vol. A
3rd edition". There is of course a newer edition than this one,
but it is worth looking at before you decide if you want to buy the
4th edition.
Conclusion:
Chess Informant is still the best product on the market in
this category, although there still is room for improvements.
The electronic version has improved with the new version of
Chess Informant Reader 1.9, and I hope (and think!) Chess
Informant will improve further with new editions.
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