The most important 6-man EGTBs?

[Donic]

Hi,
as I have limited space on my HD and am not willing to download all 1.2 TB of the 6-man EGTBs (besides, I think in practical play they harm more than help), I would like to know which are the most important 6-man EGTBs to download (based on statistics?)? I don't know if it makes a difference if one uses "only" 100 GB or 200 GB. But which 6-man would be the recommendations for these sizes e.g.? Thanks in advance.

BTW does a list exist which engines do the 6-man EGTB support?

[dorucalinciobanu]

Take a look here:

http://kirr.homeunix.org/chess/tablebas ... html#6_men

especially this paragraph:

The download order is completely up to you. A few things that you may consider:
1. It's good to get small bases before trying the big ones. The best start would be KNNKNN and KBBKBB.
2. It's better to get pawnless bases before getting those with pawns, to avoid the possible "incomplete tablebase problem".
3. You will have better experience if you start with bases which are already shared by many people ( and ).
4. You may like to download tablebases by "importance" order, which is based on statistics of occurrance of each ending in real games. Several such lists exist: by Dieter Bürßner, Nelson Hernandez, and Peter Kasinski.
5. You may like to first download tablebases for endgames where longer checkmates are possible.

For Your second question a quote from the excellent EGTB Guide by Aaron Tay (see attachment):

[A.4] What are the Chess programs that support endgame tables? Which format do they support?
Here's a small list.



Program Name Endgame Tablebase types supported
Fritz 6.0+
Nalimov

Junior 6.0+
Nalimov

HIARCS 7.32+
Nalimov

Nimzo8+
Nalimov, Nimzo Tablebases

Chess Tiger 14.0+*
Nalimov

Rebel Tiger 2.0*
Nalimov

Chessmaster 9000 and up
De Koning format (new)

Shredder 5.0+
Nalimov , Thompson

Chess Genius 6.5
Thompson

Patzer**,Yace Paderborn
Nalimov , Bitbases

Knightdreamer,Delfi
Bitbases

Crafty***
Nalimov

Gromit 2.2,Dragon [Pre-4.0],Bionic
Edwards

Most free Winboard engines****
Nalimov

SCID
Nalimov

Madeleine
Nalimov and GAFS


* The latest update 02/04/2001.Refer to Rebel Web site . Prior versions did not have any endgame tablebase support.

** Available as part of the GambitSoft Winboard Edition II package.

*** Old versions of Crafty used Edwards Tablebases.Crafty 15.21 onwards supports only Nalimov tablebases. Crafty 16.5 onwards also supports the use of compressed Eugene Nalimov tablebases.

**** For a full list of Winboard engines that support tablebases , refer to Engine Overview page by Leo Dijksman

[cracae]

Sorry my friends ; I (too) have just found out the answer to all our problems & questions = "Houdini"

I am sure they are vveeerrryyyyy proud of themselves. How am I so sure of my facts ?

I tested Houdini(1.5a) with only one "simple" (for a silicon ; that is-) position;- FEN :- 4K1nk/7p/8/7P/8/4N3/8/8 w - - 0 1 ; and that is of course WITHOUT ANY EGTB's !

I however ; do have a collection of 11.3 Gigs of EGTB's on my HDD, which I feel for practical and effectivity - reasons is quite necessary . Still ; - for Houdini 1.5a to get to the solution for above given study within 2 or 3 moves is quite a feat , as it is one very rare and instructive endgame study by the old-time pioneer-master Alexander Kotov , and the solution is a mate in 32 moves !

ENJOY !

wow !---> I guess they deserve this ---> " Hurray 4 HOUDINI !!! "
cracae