It sounds like -4 should be much better though; I wonder if having the gameboard would improve its gameplay?
If it's an addition, then sure seems like it wouldn't hurt. If it's to replace the algebraic notation, then I'd say very likely worse. All of it's input / experiences w.r.t. chess have been in the language of algebraic chess notation. Swapping to only providing a game board would presumably be worse.
It'd be like if all of our interactions were in English in a latin script, and then someone replaced it with emojis. We don't think in emoji's it wouldn't help us, even if that's how they're used to thinking.
While we play chess by looking at the board state, it's likely little of chat-gpts input is in that format.
And the only other concern would be memory. Would it "forget" the prior moves. But I think not, simply because it receives the full game input each play simply by how GPT APIs work with passing in all prior tokens after each iteration.
Of course, some humans can play chess quite well while blindfolded.
There is a waiting list https://openai.com/waitlist/gpt-4-api
I do hope the chat interface improves soon. It seems like low hanging fruit compared to everything else that's been accomplished ... it will be like the jump from telnet/irc/ftp to web browsers.
Instruct GTP4 to win the game and then crush it using Stockfish. Does it handle defeat gracefully?