Reviewed 9/27/07
Well, it's been over a year since my last review. To make a long story short, I've changed webhosts and now have gobs of space to fill with my useless diatribe !! Hooray !! Let's see, where did I leave off. Oh, that's right, I had just purchased a Novag Opal Plus and a Star Ruby. As I recall , I had a lot of praise for both of those machines. Out of the two, The Mephisto's Expert Travel 's (hereinafter abbreviated M.E.T) natural enemy would be of course the Opal Plus. (Now updated to the Star Opal) This is of course due to the fact that they both are real boards with real pieces. In my review of the opal plus, I somewhat lambasted the M.E.T. for having cheap looking pieces relative to the Opal plus' pieces. And yes, that part is still true. However, I cannot help but think that I was missing a bit of the forest through the trees. Why ? Well, I must confess that although I haven't been playing as much in the last year, a couple of weeks ago I started playing again. My weapons of choice for bringing to work were the opal plus and the M.E.T. Both easily fit into my backpack, so the slightly smaller Opal plus didn't really have a decisive advantage in that department. What I did notice was how difficult the Opal plus is too play with. Now mind you, I'm not referring to it's chess strength which we all know is beyond my own, but rather how my somewhat chubby fingers tend to knock the pieces around. There was not a single game which I played that I didn't have to confirm piece placement with the verify function. Unlike the M.E.T, the Opal Plus does not have an LCD window. This sometimes translates to playing a different game than I thought I was doing. How ? you may ask. Well, there are numerous ways, but I suppose the most common is to think you made your move when somehow the computer thinks you did something else. For instance, I remember capturing a piece with my knight and then verifying a couple of moves later that my knight was still on the original square, and the computer's captured piece was still on the board. This would of course relegate one to making all sorts of takebacks to get back to the correct branch point. This is not some esoteric, theoretical problem. It happens to some extent in most of the games I play. Yes, you can be real careful to prevent it I suppose. Maybe I'm just a Klutz.
Enter the M.ET ! Wow ! what a difference in "playabilty" The pegs hold the pieces in place. More importantly, the bottom pegs help register/trigger the piece placement nearly 100% of the time. The LCD window confirms both your moves and the computers. The pegged pieces also makes for faster, more accurate play. I felt some shame in criticizing it somewhat harshly for being an "ugly duckling". This machine really screams in both playability and strength. I truly enjoyed playing with it. I heard somewhere that SAITEK was going to discontinue it. For a while at wholesalechess.com it was out of stock. Lately, however, It seems the community has rallied and the M.E.T. is here to stay.
Finally, it's nice that the folks at Saitek include 4 extra queens and 4 extra pawns in case of loss. I personally put the pieces in a ziploc type baggie within the unit as to prevent the pieces from falling out when opening it up.
The M.E.T. in all it's glory !!
Size comparison to it's cousin, the Mephisto Maestro
Next to it's Arch-Enemy, the Novag Opal Plus !
For sizing reference. That's a creative zen micro next to it.