Rubik's Cube

[Modus Ponens]

I asked for Ernő Rubik's famous puzzle cube for Christmas because I decided I wanted to know how to solve it, even if it meant using a tutorial. When I got the cube, within a couple of days I had visited an excellent YouTube tutorial by a fellow named pogobat, and soon enough I had memorized the method he used. Now I can solve a scrambled cube in about two and a half minutes on average, with my fastest time being under two minutes. I know it's not that impressive, since I sort of semi-cheated, but it's a fun activity to compulsively repeat again and again.

What I would really love is a cube whose six colors, instead of the standard red, orange, yellow, green, blue and white, are red, yellow, green, cyan, blue and magenta, to represent the additive and subtractive primaries (or something).

Now I keep having these dreams where I'm over at someone's house and I notice that they have an unsolved cube sitting around, so I go to solve it, but so far I've always gotten distracted or woken up before I've finished.

Anyway, anyone else here have a cube? How about the larger or smaller varieties? I'm kinda into it now.

[Pineconn]

Ah, the Rubik's Cube. I can get no farther into the puzzle than one completed face. Perhaps I'll look into that YouTube tutorial about this. There's this kid in my school district's middle school who is able to complete a Cube in no more time than two minutes. He's crazy.

[Sute]

I had bought a Sudoku rubix cube, it was intense.

I remember when I was younger, I went to my neighbor's yard sale and messed with their rubix cube that they wanted to sell, and since I messed it up from being solved, I had to buy it from them. haha.

[Russ]

I had bought a Sudoku rubix cube, it was intense.

Those are nearly impossible to beat. So many numbers. It's insane.

[Sute]

Those are nearly impossible to beat. So many numbers. It's insane.

Haha, yes, I have absolutely no luck with the original, but I felt sassy and just wanted to have the sudoku version on my keychain.

Lucky for me, the keychain broke before my spirit did. :googly:

[Mitsukara]

I've yet to ever try a real Rubik's cube. I've played with one of those semi-knock off (I think? Not sure how common/legitimate/liked/etc. those are) "square one" things where the pieces are odd-shaped, and you have to put it in the right combination to make a square (and the sides in matching colors). I was horrible at it, failing to make any sort of tangible progress at all.

Someday I should try a real Rubik's cube, but I don't have high hopes for how that'll turn out on my part.

[Grasshopper]

When I was a little kid, the only way I solved the cube was by changing the stickers around. Heh. But I never bothered to try and solve one. I did see a Rubik's Cube Jr (http://www.puzzlemaster.ca/puzzles/thumbnails/2x2_jr_thumb.gif), which was 4 instead of 9. I've seen larger ones too, like 4 and 5, but I'm not attempting those.

[Pineconn]

Whenever I screw up my Rubik's Cube, I always use this website (http://www.roobik.com/) to fix it. It always gets the job done!

[Modus Ponens]

Yeah, I used Rob's Rubik Repair a couple times before I learned a solving method.

[phattonez]

Rubik's Cube = impossible unless you want to try to understand those stupid guides or spend hours upon hours just guessing.

In the end, it's all about possible 2-dimensional puzzles.

[Gleeok]

Surely someone has at least solved the 2x2 cube. That one is definitely do-able with some powers of concentration. ...Well here's how I ended up with one: Back in 2004 when I was unemployed I got a 25 dollar check in the mail from my Grandma for my birthday, with a note "Buy something fun!". So if I remember right, I bought Champions of Norrath, and remember walking past the "other" game store in the mall, saw it in the window all shiny looking, and with the money leftover I got me a cube. Never even played the ps2 that week, I just sat and became obsessed with the cube for about 6-7 days, probably 8 hours a day. @_@ It's a good thing not having internet at the time, otherwise I most certainly would've cheated, but I think anyone can solve it. All you need is lots of time, lots of patience, and a pen and paper. Yes, trust me when I saw you're going to need to write stuff down on paper. Basically it worked like this for me: The first couple of days you realize you've been wasting your time going about trying to solve it stupidly, repeatedly bash your head into a wall, and start from scratch. After another day you figure out that you have great freedom in moving any three or four sides of the cube without messing up what you have already "solved" as long as you keep track of the solved portions. And the next 3-4 days are spent cursing and trying to get the last side arranged...very frustrating that is, hence the pen and paper. And THEN it takes a bit to even solve it a second and third time. XD

After that it's pretty fun though. I used to mess with it every day when I got up at the crack of noon while drinking my coffee before work. I've done it under a minute a handfull of times but nothing spectacular. It's amazing though with two algorithms' you can solve it fairly easily, one for sides and one for corners, at least, that's the one someone showed me a while back, not sure if it's the same as what's on the site you posted..anyway, good times.

[Modus Ponens]

[W]ith two algorithms' you can solve it fairly easily, one for sides and one for corners ...

Isn't every cubelet on the 2x2x2 cube a corner, though?

[phattonez]

Where do they sell a 2x2x2 cube? I might be able to do that one.

[Gleeok]

Isn't every cubelet on the 2x2x2 cube a corner, though?

Huh, no, My post was referring to the 3x3x3 cube. XD

[Modus Ponens]

Ah, right. That does explain it.

Yeah, the method I learned, which I assume to be among the easiest to learn but probably not so hot in terms of speed, is so elegant, you know? It like...makes sense. When you analyze the algorithms involved, and when you keep an eye on the cube as you're solving it, you can start to see how it works. It's pretty neat.

Some guy on YouTube made what is essentially a Rubik's Octohedron. WANT.

[Ich]

I learned how to do this from an old booklet I found in a box in my attic that probably dated back to 1982 or so. I acquired a cube and played around with it, and eventually my fingers memorized how to solve it. It's difficult to explain to other people how it is all muscle memory, but it works well for me. My best time was around 1:45, but I am not nearly as fast now because I don't remember how to solve the bottom corners except by trial and error. Still fun to do at a party around drunk people.