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aznanimedude

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it's nothing new, ahaha the tips i gave you are the ones i need doing myself anyway :p, but yeah when i read that i thought it was a really good idea of how you should be approaching lookahead
 

Hunter

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Thanks aznanimedude!

I will try that and possibly post a video some time in the near future.

Another thing I have been working on is inserting the F2L pairs without turning the cube.

By the way, what does CFOP stand for? I see it all the time.

-Hunter

Edit - If that was 43 seconds...that's my new 3x3 PB!!
 
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Hunter

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Me again.

This time, I brought my 4x4.

Just after I solved the centers I got all screwed up on some of the first edge pieces.

Other than that, it was an OK solve and I would love any feedback that you guys might have.



Thank you, again,
Hunter

 
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Noahaha

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Me again.

This time, I brought my 4x4.

Just after I solved the centers I got all screwed up on some of the first edge pieces.

Other than that, it was an OK solve and I would love any feedback that you guys might have.



Thank you, again,
Hunter


Loosen your cube and don't make a video with an alg sheet in it =P.

Centers can be really automatic and it's not hard to do them under 25 seconds. Never do a slice move during centers, just stick to wide turns. Also, the tightness of your cube is killing you. There are very few places that a center piece can be so it's easy to get lookahead for centers.

For edges try to do less cube rotations and learn to pair up 2, 4 or even 6 edges at a time using the E-slice. It's good to have a very structured system for edges. I personally use 6-4-2.

Overall, you just need to eliminate pauses and you can be sub 2 in no time.
 
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anthonyB

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I don't know how I could help anyone, but I'll check this thread to at least instill some knowledge to people.

Anyway, here's my average of 5.


It's a bit dark so sorry about that and the microphone for my phone doesn't work when I take videos, so I added some Chopin to uplift the mood.

Some information is in the description in the video
 
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jeff081692

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2 Reconstructions in the description. Any tips on what to focus on would be appreciated even though since I looked at my solves like this for the first time I see some things I must improve on.

@anthonyB you already see that PLL is one of your weaknesses so try learning 1 PLL a day until you are done. Recognition usually comes with time. And eventually you will want to be able to recognize most PLL if not all from looking at only 2 sides but the first step is just learning full PLL. The way I practice PLL is to have a microsoft word document with all my PLL algs and next to each of them is my best single, avg5, avg12. Set a goal for your PLL and try to get each algorithm under your goal. Don't make the goal too impossible or things won't work out well. On Jessica Fridrich's speedcubing page the breakdown of a solve was
cross-2,
F2L pairs-8,
OLL 3,
PLL 4,
total-17.
So if your goal was 17 seconds try to get your PLL under 4 and then you know you should work on other parts of your solve more if you wanted to reach 17 according to her breakdowns. This is not necessary to do this is just, how I like doing things. And obviously there are people a lot faster than this. So just pick a goal and work at it.

I myself am trying to get my PLL under 2 seconds and I can sub 2 avg of 12 all of them except for F and N perms. Each day as a warm up I would bring up my sheet and try to get a sub 2 single of each algorithm that I have already done sub 2 of 12. Easier algs I get on the first try and some algs take multiple tries. Once I finish each alg that I have done sub 2 of 12 then I drill a random alg that is not sub 2 of 12 and look at youtube videos and compare my execution to others to see what is wrong. I don't spend too much time drilling algs however. Just enough to sub 2 any alg I have proven to sub 2 avg of 12 and about 100 or less executions of the random alg that I need work on. Then I move on to my normal avg 100 training.

Read this page if you haven't already.
http://www.cubefreak.net/speed/articles/tips.php

Sorry I only talk about PLL but I always focus on one thing and eliminate that weakness while doing lots of solves at the same time. F2L is probably the most important part of a solve to master but I find LL algs easier to practice and measure improvement but any tip you see for other peoples vids might also apply to you so be on the look out.

BTW this is my recommendation to anyone that feels they want to work on their PLL
Time all you Algs set goals try to improve on them each day but don't spend too much time on it. If you are advanced learn to recognize PLL from 2 adjacent sides. Sub 1 each alg, break UWRs for PLL time attack (optional).

If anything is unclear let me know because I was just kind of typing what came to mind and trying to put thoughts into stuff that makes sense.

Edit: extra resources to help execution
Breandan http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fWyjLAiEL9o
Feliks http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kossdjLYqsc
Cornelius http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m5s0TGmmr5I&feature=plcp
 
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MeshuggahX

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Me again.

This time, I brought my 4x4.

Just after I solved the centers I got all screwed up on some of the first edge pieces.

Other than that, it was an OK solve and I would love any feedback that you guys might have.



Thank you, again,
Hunter
Be more efficient with centerpieces, see what different ways you can solve them on. For edges, learn a more "advanced" edge pairing method. I personally like 3-2-2-2-3. It will make it easier to find pieces. At least that's what I think. I don't have anything special to add on the 3x3 stage. When you get more comfortable solving you should try and lookahead. But before you're comfortable with the method lookahead probably won't give any real advantage.
 

Ickathu

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I don't really see anyone that I can effectively critique, sorry.

Here's my PB average of 5 with Roux. Any tips? Now that I got a sub-20 single (my first roux sub 20 on camera!), I guess I'm switching to roux. I need advice though. This was a pretty good average for me. My breakdown looks to be about (FB, SB, C, E): 4-8-8-7 (I suck at alg execution, hence the 8 second corners). I think I'm pretty good at First block though.

Edit: Sorry it's blurry. I hope you guys can still see what I'm doing. My camera was being weird.

Bump. It's been almost a week.


And I think everyone else has been critiqued already, so I have nothing to leave. Sorry.
 
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Noahaha

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Bump. It's been almost a week.


And I think everyone else has been critiqued already, so I have nothing to leave. Sorry.

Definitely work on efficiency. You don't have serious pauses but it seems like you're making well over 60 turns per solve. Unless I'm mistaken a good roux user averages like 50 moves. Do some linear FMC.
 

gogozerg

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Bad angle, we cannot see what's going on with the second block. Poor looking ahead and unefficient move sequences?
Try to impove cube stability.
And buy a black cube!

Next time: average <20s?
 

Ickathu

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Bad angle, we cannot see what's going on with the second block. Poor looking ahead and unefficient move sequences?
Try to impove cube stability.
And buy a black cube!

Next time: average <20s?

But if I change the angle you won't be able to see first block...

Why black cube?

I second that. How about Black stickers? I just put those on my cubes. Better contrast, but I'm still getting used to them during EO.
 

JonnyWhoopes

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I don't really see anyone that I can effectively critique, sorry.

Here's my PB average of 5 with Roux. Any tips? Now that I got a sub-20 single (my first roux sub 20 on camera!), I guess I'm switching to roux. I need advice though. This was a pretty good average for me. My breakdown looks to be about (FB, SB, C, E): 4-8-8-7 (I suck at alg execution, hence the 8 second corners). I think I'm pretty good at First block though.
\

Edit: Sorry it's blurry. I hope you guys can still see what I'm doing. My camera was being weird.

Bump. It's been almost a week.


And I think everyone else has been critiqued already, so I have nothing to leave. Sorry.

Some critiques:

- Plan out the whole first block, or at the very least know where the pieces of the last pair will be after the 2x2x1. Also, don't rotate during first block. I started that habit long ago, and it's costing me big time in lookahead.
- Be much more efficient in the second block, that is where you're losing nearly all of your speed. The fewer moves you use, the slower you can turn to improve look ahead.
- Have a cube that handles M moves better? I couldn't tell from the video if it was a lack of skill on your part or a poorly Roux optimized cube.
- Practice LSE a ton. Lookahead is EVERYTHING for those steps, so practice turning fast and knowing what you're doing even if you can't follow it with your eyes.
- Don't worry about CMLL too much, it's probably the one step that improves without much attention payed to it.

There's probably more if I thought about it longer. These are just off the top of my head.
 
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Ninja Storm

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I see a big problem with M-Slices. They're way too slow. Try just doing LSE over and over to get the feel of M-slices, as well as practicing look-ahead.

On a completely different note, 7x7:

 
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Ickathu

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Some critiques:

- Plan out the whole first block, or at the very least know where the pieces of the last pair will be after the 2x2x1. Also, don't rotate during first block. I started that habit long ago, and it's costing me big time in lookahead.
- Be much more efficient in the second block, that is where you're losing nearly all of your speed. The fewer moves you use, the slower you can turn to improve look ahead.
- Have a cube that handles M moves better? I couldn't tell from the video if it was a lack of skill on your part or a poorly Roux optimized cube.
- Practice LSE a ton. Lookahead is EVERYTHING for those steps, so practice turning fast and knowing what you're doing even if you can't follow it with your eyes.
- Don't worry about CMLL too much, it's probably the one step that improves without much attention payed to it.

There's probably more if I thought about it longer. These are just off the top of my head.

My second block stinks, and I don't know why. Should I just do FMC and look at walk-through solves for that, or will it just get better with practice?
Alright. Later I'll see if I can do like an ao100 of just LSE. That shouldn't be too hard.
I was using an FII in this video, because my dayans were upstairs lol. I alternate between a heavily modded guhong v1 and a lingyun v2 as my main. They do M moves a lot better, but my skill is also not to good when it comes to M. M' U' stuff is fine, because I'm used to flicking with my Right ring finger. When I try to flick with my left hand I'm dreadful at it.

Thanks.
 
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