Monthly Computer Cube Competition 1: June 2009

[qqwref]

I updated the first post. Let me know if I've missed anything

Michael,
Why is this Monthly? It should be weekly or bi-weekly. Don't make me do gigaminx.
Monthly would give me more than enough time to do all the events, but some of these puzzles I just don't want to touch.

The reason this is monthly is because I have no idea how much interest it will generate. If it picks up, I'll consider making it happen more often. And don't do gigaminx unless you want to... at least you aren't doing as much as Mike Hughey, who does three 4x4BLDs, three 5x5BLDs, a 6x6BLD, and a 7x7BLD every week, and apparently wants to do all the events in this competition too! (Much respect, Mike.) Just doing one gigaminx solve every week or so will make you improve quite a bit, by the way. Eidolon had a PB of over an hour a few weeks ago, and then he did (iirc) two solves for fun and three for this competition, and now his best time is 26 minutes.

No I haven't thought about changing the keyboard layout. I'm assuming that Andy didn't change his keyboard layout when he did his sub-15 OH avg, but I don't know...

I don't think he did. His solves have a lot of stuff that says he used a normal layout and pretty much kept his hand on one side of the keyboard.


And Mike: You may think you're bad at everything, but you almost beat Ethan Rosen at 3x3 clock... maybe if you had done a few more practice solves

 

[Mike Hughey]

... apparently wants to do all the events in this competition too!

Yes, I do, although admittedly I'm a little scared by the remaining ones I've never tried. (Helicopter cube, super-X, skewb, and of course gigaminx.) I want to do them all without practice solves. I hope I can figure out how to do them when I actually try them.

And Mike: You may think you're bad at everything, but you almost beat Ethan Rosen at 3x3 clock... maybe if you had done a few more practice solves

Huh. And he's even better than me at clock with the real thing (which admittedly doesn't take much). (Not to mention that he's really good at computer cubes.) It's a real surprise to me I almost caught him. But Ethan, you still beat me - congratulations!

 

[Robert-Y]

Hey, I've thought of another category...

3x3x3 no rotations at all (including inspection) average of 5 . I've tried it a few times, it's not actually too difficult, the hardest part I found was when you have to use B moves, but it's not much of a problem after some practice.

 

[fanwuq]

Hey, I've thought of another category...

3x3x3 no rotations at all (including inspection) average of 5 . I've tried it a few times, it's not actually too difficult, the hardest part I found was when you have to use B moves, but it's not much of a problem after some practice.

That's pointless, not hard at all. In fact, that's how I did my pyraminx solves this competition. You can't rotate in Jfly's pyraminx simulator.

 

[Robert-Y]

Hey, I've thought of another category...

3x3x3 no rotations at all (including inspection) average of 5 . I've tried it a few times, it's not actually too difficult, the hardest part I found was when you have to use B moves, but it's not much of a problem after some practice.

That's pointless, not hard at all. In fact, that's how I did my pyraminx solves this competition. You can't rotate in Jfly's pyraminx simulator.

Oh wait, I forgot, I'm talking about Ryan's original cube simulator if that changes anything...

EDIT: Yay, just did a 10.41

 

[qqwref]

Uh, that's not a new puzzle or event at all. That's just a silly way of doing a normal puzzle. Not adding it (or OH).

 

[Robert-Y]

... Ok

Btw, is anyone else going to do BLD (apart from maybe Spef)?

 

[Mike Hughey]

... Ok

Btw, is anyone else going to do BLD (apart from maybe Spef)?

I already said I intend to, but I'm waiting a little while because I think if I did it right now, I'd make too many keystroke mistakes and blow it. I want to at least have a chance at success. I still too often get confused about which key to hit when making moves.

 

[Ethan Rosen]

@Mike. Thanks! I strongly recommend solving a few of the easier puzzles before trying the super-x. The reasoning behind this isn't that the super-x is particularly hard, just that the controls for gelatinbrain can be a bit annoying. I do strongly recommend the super-x though.

 

[masterofthebass]

Gigaminx: 15:53, (16:33), (14:14) = 15:33.33

Super-X: 2:45, 2:56, DNF (parity), 4:28, 3:18 = 2:45

 

[MatsBergsten]

... Ok

Btw, is anyone else going to do BLD (apart from maybe Spef)?

I tried but I cannot turn the cube and make the moves sufficiently good.
I realize I would rather practice on a real cube.

 

[Ethan Rosen]

Ok this is probably my last one

Megaminx: 4:34 (4:52) 4:48 (4:02) 4:26
Average: 4:36

 

[Jude]

Sorry, I guess I just expected that you'd be a bit more patient with it, and thought you were kind of lazy for just immediately assuming it only did 3x3. The first thing I do when I see a new simulator is to play with it and explore all the things it can do, and if someone gave me a link to a simulator in response to a question about where to find a 2x2 one, the first thing I'd look for would be the 2x2 option. Sorry for being condescending.

Good response. Seriously, despite clearly losing the 'argument', it made me smile. Nh sir.

Edit: Forgot 'nh' is not a commonly used acronym. It means 'nice hand' and is used in Poker when you are outplayed.

 

[Lt-UnReaL]

2x2: 5.76, (2.67), (9.23), 5.67, 9.00, 6.47, 3.88, 4.86, 5.34, 8.25, 2.76, 6.38
5.837 avg

3x3: 19.02, (24.25), 19.66, 21.89, 18.26, 21.02, 20.11, (15.99), 19.25, 19.93, 16.77, 23.49
19.940 avg

 

[Mike Hughey]

I just wanted to say that I did them all! I suspect that will be a lot easier next month. (Unless Michael decides to add a bunch of new puzzles next month.)

I was very happy that I was able to solve them all. For most of them, I counted my first attempt, just to make it more challenging.

 

[qqwref]

I updated the front post. Really nice job for doing all the puzzles Mike I think I'm going to try 3BLD just so I can share that with you, but I doubt I'll succeed

By the way, I only see 11 pyraminx solves in your post. So your 7:30 is unfortunately counting. (Or you could just do another solve.)

 

[Ethan Rosen]

@Mike:
First off, nice job solving everything!
Second, a faster way to do Parity on super-x is to do a Jperm and then resolve. I take no credit for this btw, it was qqwref's idea

 

[Mike Hughey]

@Mike:
First off, nice job solving everything!

Thank you - I have to admit I'm really rather proud of it. Although admittedly it's totally nothing compared to all the computer puzzles you've solved.

Second, a faster way to do Parity on super-x is to do a Jperm and then resolve. I take no credit for this btw, it was qqwref's idea

That's nice. That would definitely make a big difference - half the work!

 

[Mike Hughey]

Huh. I can't believe I only did 11 pyraminx solves. I hate DNFs - especially when they're for something that stupid. It's funny - I threw out best and worst, totaled the other 9, and then divided by 10. And the average was way better, since my first solve was SO BAD. Oh well, maybe I'll do better next month.

My goal next month: to not be last place among non-DNFs in at least one event, for a change.

 

[qqwref]

Okay, sorry for not updating earlier, but the final update is now

I did five BLD solves, but they were all DNFs

These are the final rankings. I've decided that I'm going to give out points as follows:
- In every event, the top five places get 6, 4, 3, 2, and 1 point(s) respectively.
- If there are not five competitors in an event, any prizes not handed out are discarded, and not divided among the winners of that event.
- A DNF receives no points, even if it was in the top 5 results.
So, here are the final results, and then the rankings for all events:

Final Results
1: qqwref - 86 points!!!
2: Mike Hughey - 39 points!!
3: Ethan Rosen - 26 points!
4: Robert-Y: 20 points
5: masterofthebass: 14 points
6: tsaoenator & fanwuq: 8 points
8: byu: 6 points
9: MistArts, SimonWestlund, & trying-to-speedcube...: 4 points
12: Lt-UnReaL & alifiantoadinugroho: 3 points
14: blade740 & fazrulz: 2 points
16: Sa67St: 1 point
17: edw0010 & Jude: no points

Individual events:

[B]2x2[/B]
1. qqwref: 5.075
2. Robert-Y: 5.138
3. Lt-UnReaL: 5.837
4. fazrulz: 6.936
5. fanwuq: 7.151
6. SimonWestlund: 7.262
7. masterofthebass: 7.319
8. trying-to-speedcube...: 9.168
9. byu: 10.779
10. Ethan Rosen: 16.1
11. edw0010: 23.498
12. Mike Hughey: 56.505
13. Jude: DNF

[B]3x3[/B]
1. Robert-Y: 11.221
2. tsaoenator: 11.346
3. qqwref: 13.048
4. masterofthebass: 16.002
5. Sa67St: 16.374
6. fanwuq: 17.635
7. Lt-UnReaL: 19.940
8. fazrulz: 24.637
9. byu: 27.248
10. trying-to-speedcube...: 29.911
11. Mike Hughey: 1:57.678
12. SimonWestlund: DNF

[B]4x4[/B]
1. Robert-Y: 40.900
2. tsaoenator: 42.513
3. qqwref: 43.827
4. masterofthebass: 55.910
5. fanwuq: 1:05.810
6. trying-to-speedcube...: 2:28.383
7. Mike Hughey: 8:02.407

[B]5x5[/B]
1. qqwref: 1:10.503
2. Robert-Y: 1:11.180
3. masterofthebass: 1:24.173
4. Mike Hughey: 10:06.780

[B]6x6[/B]
1. qqwref: 2:14.753
2. Mike Hughey: 21:23.397

[B]7x7[/B]
1. qqwref: 3:14.233
2. Mike Hughey: 21:49.343

[B]3x3 BLD[/B]
1. byu: 4:15.36
2. Mike Hughey: 5:50.32
3. qqwref: DNF

[B]Clock (3x3)[/B]
1. qqwref: 10.9789
2. SimonWestlund: 18.912
3. alifiantoadinugroho: 28.9453
4. Ethan Rosen: 46.6142
5. Mike Hughey: 47.760

[B]Clock (5x5)[/B]
1. qqwref: 31.0256
2. MistArts: 53.0677
3. Mike Hughey: 3:23.651

[B]Dino Cube[/B]
1. qqwref: 10.9
2. Ethan Rosen: 12.8
3. Mike Hughey: 3:12.1

[B]Gigaminx[/B]
1. qqwref: 10:54.3
2. masterofthebass: 15:33.3
3. Ethan Rosen: 25:30.7
4. blade740: 28:57.3
5. Mike Hughey: 47:41.3

[B]Helicopter Cube[/B]
1. qqwref: 45.3
2. Ethan Rosen: 2:22.3
3. Mike Hughey: 11:45.3

[B]Megaminx[/B]
1. qqwref: 1:18.0
2. Ethan Rosen: 4:36.0
3. Mike Hughey: 12:31.7

[B]Pyraminx[/B]
1. fanwuq: 10.801
2. qqwref: 11.0
3. Ethan Rosen: 13.4
4. Mike Hughey: 2:09.437

[B]Skewb[/B]
1. qqwref: 19.9
2. Mike Hughey: 10:02.7

[B]Square-1[/B]
1. qqwref: 41.670
2. trying-to-speedcube...: 2:00.860
3. Mike Hughey: 2:44.710

[B]Super-X[/B]
1. Ethan Rosen: 1:32.3
2. qqwref: 1:43.3
3. masterofthebass: 3:34.0
4. Mike Hughey: 21:25.7