I was an original supporter of Chessup 1 and kickstarter and bought everything you offered for me as well as a set for my son. The goal was to fit games in while he was still in college. We waited through all the delays etc… to get the chessup 1’s. By the time we got them my son had started his new career and I had started another company. Neither of us has had time to use chessup 1. I decided to go a ahead and unpack mine this week and was stunned to find there is a chessup 2. Have I totally wasted our $$$ and now chessup 2 is the new focus of bryghtlabs? What are the absolute differences between 1 & 2? What features in chessup 1 will never be able to be upgraded to in chessup 2.
Chess Up 1 goal was met in May 2021. Looks like it was promised to be delivered Nov 2021, but didn’t actually ship until Oct 2022? Twelve months behind schedule is quite a bit, but it was a first version Kickstarter after all.
Now we’re in 2025, and your upset that you sat staring at an unopened box for two and a half years and the company is focused on the next iteration of the product instead of the one you never opened?
Anyway, it looks like ChessUp1 is still getting updates. But it would be unreasonable to expect the same support and features they will be delivering in ChessUp2 at this point in my opinion.
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Right now chessup 2 doesn’t work as well as chessup 1. But the main difference is piece recognition. Try playing with the board now that you dusted it off.
I’m not upset, that amount of money is not going to change my life if I was to switch to another company or never use it.
Besides assuming that you know what I am feeling I asked for the differences between the two which you failed to answer.
Best tio stay on topic instead of making assumptions and giving opinions.
Like they assume makes an….
Opinions are like …. Everyone has one.
I would like clear answers if you have them.
Thank you for the info that chessup 1 is still being updated
In addition I’m in US and mine was shipped after you stated.
Thanks anyway
Thanks David, that is what I plan to do.
Are you aware of specific differences between the two
J
New board has piece recognition so that if you put a rook on f6 the board knows there is a rook there.
The first board only knows what the pieces are based on the initial setup and all the moves they followed. This is meaningless for playing games but a real time saver for setting up puzzles. The old board requires you to import a FEN string of the puzzle before it will let you just set it up on board because it doesn’t know what the pieces are by itself.
The new board has the built in WiFi so you can play without a phone nearby.
@jaybird In addition to piece recognition and built in wi-fi as mentioned by DavidS, there is the somewhat obvious LCD screen on Chessup2.
FWIW, I don’t own Chessup 1, but have the Millennium eOne board which is very similar in functionality. Being able to play on Chessup 2 w/o a phone or tablet running an app is nice, but chess.com gameplay on the eOne was fine and I’d expect similar to Chessup 1.
Another option for you would be to sell the Chessup 1 on ebay or a similar site and “upgrade” to Chessup 2. You can still buy a new Chessup 1 on Amazon for $199 and it looks like used versions are selling on ebay for $125-150.
But if you haven’t yet used an eboard to play online give it a try! I find it much different than playing on a screen and enjoy it a lot more
I just don’t see why you used the term ‘waster $$$’ in the subject line…except that you chose to buy it for one reason and then let it sit while you did not bother to open it.
I mean, I can buy a new car with the idea of driving to Alaska…but lets say Canada closes it’s border to the US and I can’t go…and I let the car set for 3 yrs without using it - there are plenty of other places to drive. The car still works fine…but you never bothered to use it for 3 yrs.
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ChessUp 2 is superior in many ways. I was a supporter of the original ChessUp 1. It arrived and I have enjoyed the tech and game play. I also supported ChessUp 2 kickstarter. The board came and it is amazing. It has all the features that one would want. It keeps getting more functional and better with each update. I don’t feel like I wasted my money on ChessUp 1. It works great. So good that I just gave my ChessUp 1 away as a gift to a friend who has children wanting to learn chess. It is perfect for that and for playing online using chess.com and lichess through the app. The app works very well. No complaints. ChessUp 2 does have piece recognition, wi-fi connectivity, a touch screen for easy user interface and chess.com integration and soon Lichess integration. Also, a board editor for setting up positions and puzzles and playing them out against Stockfish for analysis. So it is better in many ways. ChessUp 1 is also good for the features it has. It looks like the company will continue to support both versions.
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