I haven't had time for much serious chess stuff lately, but in between work and being on holiday I've had a lot of fun downloading free engines (from Ridderkerk and the other major sites) into the free Arena GUI and testing them out. I've spent the most time with what are probably the strongest (Rybka 1.0, Toga 32-bit, Fruit_21, Gambit Fruit-4bx, Strelka 1.8, Naum), but have acquired forty or fifty of the things almost without trying! Hours of fun! ... I've generally got slaughtered at blitz as you might expect, but I did manage a draw against Rybka, which cheered me up!

Has anyone else had particular experiences or thoughts about these free engines? I haven't got into engine matches yet, nor into importing different opening books, personalities, etc. -- I guess that's the next step, but then with the season about to begin I'm looking forward to some real chess!