Yes. You need to install Chess King with administrator privileges in Win7-64, and then of course also run it with administrator privileges as well and all should be fine.

Try setting the Windows taskbar properties to "auto-hide the taskbar", this may help.

Yes, we have published 20 free video tutorials, have a look at the "Tutorials" Playlist on our YouTube channel "ChessKing". The list of topics covered is here.

Out of the 500+ installs as of Feb. 13, 2012, we have 3 reports of failed installs, all on LENOVO machines, specifically Z560 laptop, W520, and E420. This means there is something not standard in some Lenovo machines that is stopping full installation. We are investigating the issue to see if anyone with Lenovo has been able to install Chess King and our programmers are preparing troubleshooting tools and a possible fix. We heard that Chess King installed fine on a Lenovo B570 (Intel Pentium CPU B940 2Ghz 4GM ram, 64 bit) Running Windows 7 Home Premium SP1. So Lenovo users please check you have SP1 installed.

The Chess King DVD and installer should be automatically recognized in any Windows system, since it includes the file autorun.inf that calls up the installer. If for some reason your system does not allow the installer to start automatically, simply double-click the file ChessKing_Setup.exe and installation will begin.

Yes Chess King can open both universal .pgn files and .cdp (Aquarium and Chess Assistant) files.

Maybe you installed Chess King in a directory such as C:\Program Files(x86)\ChessKing\Data which is not allowed in Visata and Windows 7. You should rather install Chess King in a directory such as C:\ChessKing\Data or D:\ChessKingData and then all Updates will be installed automatically and without problems.

We have a user base of 500+ installs, including many Vista PC's. What is important is that you have the official Vista Service Packs installed. We have not noticed any problems with a clean Window system with SP 1 installed. If you have some problems with the installation, make sure to let us know which exact Windows System you have (to find out, either press Win+Pause, or do Start | Run then enter "cmd" and you will see the exact windows version number which is on your computer, for example for Vista SP1 you will see Microsoft Windows [version 6.0.6001]). Tell us also in as much detail as possible what else is not working. Normally, if the installer starts, and you let it run fully to the end without stopping it half way, the program should install just fine.

You are allowed to put Chess King on any number of computers you personally own, including when you have a desktop and a laptop, or even if you have a PC with some version of Windows, and also a Mac with a visualization software like VMWare Fusion or Parallels. No need to buy a second copy, you can have Chess King running on both at the same time. In the future we will add cloud services, where you will be able to store your games, analysis, etc. in the cloud and access them in a variety of ways, but it will be through a registration that starts from the serial number, so you should be the only person with your serial number, so you should keep it in a safe place, to avoid 2 people logging in at the same time. Note that this applies for personal ownership of Chess King. Schools or chess training centers with several computers should contact us to get special conditions for multi-computer installations.

Yes. To divide paths, use a semi-colon. For example c:\tb\TB5;d:\tb\TB6 To turn off a tablebase, simply put a character before the path, for example: _c:\tb\TB5;_d:\tb\TB6

Coins can be spent in order to receive hints in rated games at the higher levels.

The Chess King installer will install a 32-bit version of Houdini 2 if the computer is based on a 32-bit operating system, and a 64-bit version of Houdini, if the operating system is 64-bit. In other words, you're always sure to have the maximum power adapted to your computer with Chess King or Chess King Pro. We also guarantee the most recent versions of Houdini 2 for Chess King and Houdini 2 Pro, via auto-update.

Just press the SPACE bar to toggle the engine ON and OFF. Note that you can see the engine working only in the analysis mode and obviously not in any of the playing or puzzle solving modes.

Chess King with Houdini 2 and Chess King Pro with Houdini 2 Pro will always have the latest Houdini 2 version, via automatic auto-update. At the moment, the latest Houdini 2 release is the Houdini 2.0c, included  in both Chess King and Chess King Pro. The difference between the standard version and the Pro is that the Pro uses all available processors and the standard Houdini 2.0c uses only one processor (that's still quite decent performance and recommended if the computer is not very powerful). In Chess King Pro, the Houdini 2 Pro also has a whole series of settings that can be adjusted, whereas in Houdini 2.0c standard, the engine is optimized to run with Chess King and the only settings that can be changed are the numbers of variations you want to see in the engine analysis box.

The main difference is that the engine that powers Chess King is Houdini 2 Pro. That's a fundamental difference. For "normally powered" PC's with 1 or 2 cores, Chess King (with Houdini 2) should be fine and will manage all classical chess tasks just fine using just one processor. But for powerful PC's that have multiple cores, Houdini 2 Pro will take full advantage of all the cores and will make the analysis super fast and a tiny bit more powerful. Another difference is that Houdini 2 Pro handles play and deep engine analysis of Chess960 games, including correct castling, whereas Chess960 play and engine analysis is not supported with Chess King Standard. In addition, Chess King Pro includes an extra 685 MB file which is called giga_eval_setup.exe and adds a large opening tree with all evaluations pre-computed to save time. Chess King shows all the opening trees fully but without the evaluations. Houdini 2 Pro also allows you to control entirely the engine settings, including the hash and personalities. You can also attach the Nalimov Endgame TableBases to Houdini 2 Pro which is included in Chess King Pro. See a screenshot of the engine settings from Chess King Pro. You can upgrade anytime to Chess King Pro.

Chess King Pro fully support Endgame Tablebases. With Chess King Pro you may setup the path to Nalimov tablebases using the TOOLS button a the top of the Analysis pane (the leftmost button). The Houdini Pro engine also supports the (more rare) Gaviota tablebases. Chess King standard does not support Endgame Databases, only Chess King Pro does. See the screenshot.

Chess King is directly installable on Windows PC only. However as you can read at the end of this article, you can use Chess King quite well on a Mac via the emulator VMWare Fusion. The functionalities of Chess King in emulation mode are exactly as original and the speed is excellent given that Chess King contains the strongest engine available Houdini 2, and that Macs now use the same Intel chips as Windows.

Chess King includes a large opening book, which is capable of changing depending on the required rating (i.e. for analysis it's at the maximum, but to play at a weaker level it is modified not to follow book for a long time). It is not possible to include external opening books to Chess King. Note that there really is no need to do so, since the Opening book has been optimized for Chess King.

To go up levels very fast it's easy: all you need to do is play some "Random" games with some advantage such as "only" 25%, if you win, you will go up very fast, possibly straight to level 9. You go up levels from playing games, Quest games, or solving Puzzles.

No, it is not possible. Chess King has been optimized to work best with the strongest engine available Houdini 2 or Houdini 2 Pro.

Chess King is optimized to use a custom version of Houdini 2 to maximize its power and speed. Chess King pro uses the most powerful engine Houdini 2 Pro. Note: if you really would like to use another engine, you could edit the file engines.xml file or simply rename the new engine. But we're not too sure why you'd like to do that since Houdini 2 is the most powerful engine available todate.

Yes. Actually Chess King works on all the Windows Systems we have tested, from Windows XP systems on, all the way to the most modern systems. The fastest Windows systems that have multiple cores are ideal for Chess King Pro with Houdini 2 Pro. You won't have any equal to the power of speed of Houdini 2 Pro in a strong system. Chess King can also be installed on Mac via visualization software. See details in the answer to the FAQ question about Macs.