Proposed new TD Tip after rule 16U

[Smythe_Dakota]

Just an incidental remark or two:

@I

On the DGT North American, for example, you can program it either way … If you set the number of moves to 00, the clock adds time at minute 90, but if you set it to 40 moves, the clock adds time at move 40.

@In response

I believe this is only true on the DGT NA for increment time controls. For time controls with delay or time controls without increment or delay, you cannot set the number of moves in the first time control.

A reading of the DGT North American manual (which I downloaded a few years ago, I don’t actually own that clock) convinces me you are correct.

It gets really interesting if there are three (or four) time controls. For example, with 40/90 20/30 SD/30 inc/30, what if you set the number of moves to 40 for the first control and 00 for the second? I guess the clock would then add 30 minutes after 40 moves, and another 30 minutes after 120 minutes. Yikes!

Bill Smythe

[GKarRacer]

@Smythe Dakota

…the authors claim that it is best to set the clocks for only one control, and be reset by an arbiter at the second control. They argue that a clock that resets itself – whether (e.g. in a 40/90 SD/30 event) at move 40 or at minute 90 – is giving extra information to the players that they should not have.

Well, FIDE itself doesn’t believe this since the top level games use clocks that auto adjust the time on move 40.

[Smythe_Dakota]

And FIDE has approved clocks that do this.

Those authors make some good points, but they seem to be purists who have their heads ensconced well back into the 20th century. Newer technology has allowed (but not forced) purists to change their ideas without losing their purism.

Bill Smythe