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In Fritz, I am interested to know the differences between the Full Analysis and Blunder Check.

The differences at the first look seem superficial. For example, I wouldn't mind if there is no natural language used in the analysis which comes with full analysis. Blunder check seems to give good number of variations. So it seems better.

Is natural language the only aspect missing in Blunder Check analysis compared to full analysis? I am trying to figure out what 'full' means here.

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    I'm not sure about Fritz specifically, but a blunder is typically a situation where you're almost immediately losing material, tempo, or even the game. As such, the engine wouldn't need to go very deep to verify the position; it could simply check everything to a depth of 3 or 4 moves, and leave it at that. A full analysis needs to go a lot deeper (and thus take a lot longer), for it to be confident of the results.
    – Daniel B
    Nov 19, 2012 at 13:16
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    an important difference is that the blunder alert will not be triggered when you miss positive moves (e.g mate in one), it will only warn you from moves that severely affect you negatively.
    – ajax333221
    Nov 20, 2012 at 1:21
  • @ajax333221 your comment is probably a pretty good answer if you embellish it a bit... I honestly don't remember the difference, it's been a long time since I've used either function...
    – Andrew ♦
    Nov 21, 2012 at 14:48
  • @DanielB ajax333221 Thanks for the insights. I find full analysis frustratingly slow compared to blunder check. Since I am an amateur, I thought blunder check would be good enough. I am not really sure if blunder check doesn't help you find good moves as ajax333221 says.
    – rpattabi
    Nov 23, 2012 at 17:59
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    @ragu.pattabi I definitely think full analysis is what you need. I'm not familiar with Fritz, but it seems that you can configure how long it should take for the analysis (e.g. consider the advice on this ehow article). The game's manual will probably have more info, too. The longer you give it, the more accurate it becomes. If you just want a quick analysis, and don't worry too much about accuracy, a handful of seconds per move should be enough.
    – Daniel B
    Nov 24, 2012 at 7:37

2 Answers 2

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The following can be found on USCFSales Steve's ChessBase Tips:

“Full analysis” mode is likely the better choice for less experienced chess players, due to the relative brevity of the alternative variations it provides, the short verbal commentary, and the fact that variations are evaluated symbolically rather than with numerical values.

Blundercheck gives much more "hard" information than does "full analysis".

The core purpose in both forms of analysis remains the same: to show where each of the players went wrong and what they should have played instead. “Full analysis” mode provides the information in a much simpler form.

“Blundercheck” mode will only show improvements, not “what if…?” moves which are actually worse.

You can find much more information on the website provided above. The author, Steve Lopez, has been the authority on ChessBase/Fritz software for nearly two decades.

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  • So, there is no difference in the evaluation and the aspects evaluated. If at all there is a difference, it is only in the presentation. Is my interpretation correct?
    – rpattabi
    Nov 30, 2012 at 15:43
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The "blunder check" option is for errors only. The level of these errors can be controlled by the "threshold" value that you can define. This threshold also applies to full analysis.

The threshold value is defined in terms of Pawn weights. A high value (say 200) will result in annotation of moves that are bad enough for +-2 pawn or greater change in evaluation, probably indicating immediate or imminent loss of material. A low value (say 30) will show also small improvements indicating where errors resulted in a positional loss equivalent to about a third of a pawn or more.

Full analysis is more detailed and can create references to the DB games and also add visual cues to the commentary it generates.

Both blunder check and full analysis show where the game was lost or won according to the threshold setting.

The full analysis helps in a more detailed study of how the game developed, additionally showing interesting possibilities both good and bad outside the threshold values. So, if one side plays the best move where there was a very tempting bad move (big improvement on small number of ply analysis but turning badly negative on higher number of ply analysis) it will often show the tempting bad move with appropriate commentary.

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