Seems to me that you buy Fritz for the UI and DB handling features, not for the engine. If you’re looking for a better engine, just download Houdini and hook it up to your current version of Fritz. I use Houdini (latest version, multi-processor) with Fritz 9, and I’m completely happy with it.
That said, I don’t know what the know UI/DB handling features of Fritz 13 are, so I’ll leave that discussion to others more knowledgeable.
I don’t buy Fritz for the engine. I buy it for the playchess subscription and the interface (12, that is). That said, there are some new features database wise that are of interest. From the promo material:
[size=85]With it Fritz 13 users can join a world-wide community that will put together a giant knowledge base for chess. Whenever you analyze a position to any meaningful depth with your chess engine Fritz 13 will, if you allow it, send the main line and evaluation to a central server, to be shared by all participating users. Soon you will be able to find deep analysis to almost every position you look at – instantly, pre-generated by the finest engines in the world, running on the most powerful machines around. Gone are the days where you would have to wait for your computer to reach substantial depth in order to make sure you are not falling into a trap. You will even be able to see the analysis of different chess engines and compare their results – all without a second of wait time.
“Discover” a position! It does not matter whether you are a beginner, a club player or a Super-GM. If you use a powerful engine to analyze a hitherto unknown position with the Let’s Check function switched on, you will be automatically registered as the “discoverer” of that position.
“Conquer” chess positions! Let’s Check keeps updating the evaluations to any given position with newer, deeper analysis as this becomes available. Using powerful machines and the latest engines allows you to “conquer” positions, with your name attached to the newest, deepest analysis. You can also add comments to your analysis, which other users will see when they encounter the position.
Even if you are not a great openings expert you can become one using Let’s Check. The entire body of modern openings theory is built into the system, and Let’s Check provides you instantly with the latest statistics of any position in the opening: how often did it occur, which moves were played, with what success. The openings book (LiveBook) is updated on a weekly basis and will show you which variations are currently topical and how good they are. It will also reveal which lines are being analyzed and debated in the international community, and with what conclusions.[/size]
Sounds like they’re going to be archiving analysis on a cloud type situation. Considering that the end result of a deep positional analysis comes down to some ascii, or maybe unicode, characters… they could eventually have billions or even (given enough years), trillions of pre-determined deep positional analysis. Ascii/unicode characters can be compressed a lot. Many years ago, I read that ascii characters can be compressed to something like 97% reduction, or to a mere 3% or its original volume. I suppose Unicode isn’t too far behind that.
I guess it boils down to in the future, having chess engines that can access that database, and then use its processing time to see even a bit farther down the line. Although I suspect the reality of that is even more engine to engine draws if both engines can access the pre-determined position on the cloud.