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PokerTracker

PokerTracker is an essential tool for playing online poker. It stores every hand you play in a database, and will calculate a massive amounts of statistics on both your and your opponent's play.

PokerTracker is available from the PokerTracker website and can be used for a 60 day trial. The trial period is easily long enough to understand why such a program is so useful, and is plenty of time to decide whether PokerTracker is better than it's nearest rival, Hold'em Manager. When it comes to purchasing, the program is available in two tiers - microstakes at a low price and unlimited stakes at a higher price. Once you're playing high enough to need the higher priced version, the price is less than a buy-in.

PokerTracker's functionality falls into several different categories;

Tracking Wins/Losses

Most players will deposit some money online, play a bit, withdraw some, redeposit, switch sites etc, and it's easy to lose track of how much you've won (or lost) playing poker. PokerTracker can present your winnings in a variety of ways whether it's from cash games or tournaments. With tournaments it also calculates your ROI (return on investment).
It also tracks the rake that a site has taken from you - you'll be able to determine which sites are more expensive to play at.

Storing Hands

Every hand you play is stored in a database. This has immense value as you can look back over a session you've just played and spot where a hand went wrong or right for you. There's also a filter facility allowing you find specific situations. For example, you've been told that it's a good idea to fold low suited connectors to a 3bet out of position - you can set the filter to show only those hands and see if it's true. The hands can be viewed in simple text format or played as an animation.

Statistics

As you play more and more hands certain playing habits will become apparent. PokerTracker maintains hundreds of statistics on your play (and your opponents) giving you information to fixing the weak areas of your game. Again the filters come into play and allow you to see how your statistics vary either in specific situations or over specified time spans.

The HUD (Heads Up Display)

Since PokerTracker has stored so much information about your opponents, it'll be useful to have that information to hand while playing. This is where the HUD comes in. PokerTracker overlays the information over the table as you play. What you display on the HUD is entirely up to you, and can be an essential tool to understanding your opponents.