Life In 19x19

I saw a game review of a Crazy Stone game made by breakfast (Dinerchtein 3p), he was was surprised that the moves from 17 to 71, (first time it beat a 5d in KGS, I think) were pro level in all aspects of the game."They were played on pro level! No mistakes at all. Nice shapes, good sacrifising. Who said that computers cannot understand ko fights?".

Now, I'm not saying a beginner needs a program that can beat pros on 4H, but is certainly doesn't hurt. The stronger the opponent, the more positive things one picks up. The whole argument against software is that you learn how to exploit it's glaring weaknesses. There are very few of these left. And as you say, the hardware required is not that expensive anymore, top end i7 processors which, give it 18 or less, will be mid range.

Dudoso

Maybe going over all the possibilities (of computer opponents) would be of some help here as this question is very much related to what strength opponent one needs at one's current state of go learning. Some of these are free as in "free software", others "free as in beer" (some specific version) and some you have to pay for.

absolute beginner --- I'd suggest the MFOG free trial version. It only plays at the 18 kyu level but that's fine for an absolute beginner. It only has the lowest level problem sets, etc. but again that's fine for beginners.

next level up ------- gnugo I understand there may be some problems with being able to set level of play but even so, when a beginner is beating MFOG 18 kyu should be able to play against gnugo taking 9 stones. Gnugo is "free software". Of course if not politically opposed to paying for software, could continue with MFOG if that's what you started with. NOTE: the actual cost of MFOG isn't high IF several go players in the family as it's a per site cost, not a per computer license and includes future upgrades at low or no cost. Always check things like that out when comparing software for purchase; what rights are you purchasing? (do you have to pay again when you migrate to a new computer or is that included, etc.)

next level up -- above 7-8 kyu you should be playing only against a MCTS based program. Fuego is a "free software" option, most of the others aren't, and the exceptions to that may require ability to do your own compiling, etc. Remember, that last part isn't even a violation of "free software" rules (technically the "free software" bit only refers to source code -- anybody can charge you for the service of compiling that for your machine if they want and nobody else willing to do that for you for free). The point here is that there are a number of options able to play 1-2 dan on a reasonable home machine (and 3-4 dan on a very powerful "workstation" class machine. As a side note, possible to get a reconditioned machine in this class for <$1000. But a "laptop" that powerful would be both harder to find and much more expensive, even a reconditioned one)

Thanks for the tips in here.

I've also been playing against GnuGo on my phone via ElyGo recently and have been loosing 19x19 non-handi games by 80-100 points -_-;

I used to play against Go Free (Aya Go Engine) on my phone and could beat it regularly. I will try to play some handicap games against GnuGo. When I set the difficulty on GnuGo is it actually doing anything?

The easiest and best for you to do is to grant yourself a couple of handi stones, and reduce the number once you were able to beat GnuGo.