Download Pharaon for Win9x/NT/2000/XP/XP 64

 

I. Download pharaon.zip (it contains both the engine and the opening book).

Here is the description of the files :

about.htm

Documentation file (in HTML format)

z_book.bin

The opening book.

z_style.txt

The Pharaon 'style' book with the moves to play (!!/!/!?) and to avoid (??/?/?!) in the opening part of the game

pha.bat

An exemple batch file to illustrate how to use Pharaon with WinBoard

Pharaon.exe

the Pharaon executable

Pharaon.ini

the config file: many explanations in it.
You can enable or disable *most* options of the search (cut off, PVS, NULL MOVE, HASH TABLES...).

 

II. Download WinBoard

It is a free graphical interface for many chess engines.
To use Pharaon with WinBoard, unzip the pharaon.zip file in the directory where WinBoard was installed, and run zch.bat (the exemple file).
The file contains the following line:

winboard.exe /cp -ponder /tc="10" /inc="0" -fcp "pharaon " -scp "pharaon "

(/tc is the time control [here 10 minuts/side])

You'll learn much more about the (numerous) features of winboard (how to make a match between two programs, how to use a program on ICC, etc...) by reading the .hlp file provided with winboard.

 

III. If you have any questions

I will be very happy to answer them if I can, just e-mail me: Franck ZIBI