Older cubers discussions

[muchacho]

If times bother you, before using them in speedsolves use some tool to practice them until you are at least as fast with them as 2-look or use them when doing slow solves.

At least for me it takes time to be fast with new algs (I'm still 10 algs away from full CMLL), like a few weeks, maybe partly because I don't do much slow solves and I don't like practicing algs.

 

[teacher77]

@Jason Green

Thanks ! Do you recall how much time it took before your times actually improved ?

 

[mark49152]

Do you recall how much time it took before your times actually improved ?

My 2 cents is this. You're making an investment, learning things that will pay off later, and it all gets absorbed into the big picture. Actually at 40 seconds PLL is not the main factor. You could do 1000 solves to bed your PLLs in, but at the end of that, the improvement that you see might be as much down to 1000 solves of F2L practice as your new PLLs themselves. When you hit 30 or 20 and look back on your progress, it won't feel like it was mostly down to learning X or learning Y. It will just feel like you know the cube way better and it will all feel so much easier and automatic, like riding a bike. That's why you sometimes see fast guys on here saying they are sub-12 with 4 look or whatever. Their point is not that you shouldn't learn PLL, it's that familiarity and skill with the cube is more important than alg sets.

Also, doing drills, untimed solves and targeted practice is always worthwhile IMHO.

 

[JanW]

@teacher77 I can't really compare my own PLL learning progress to your case. I started learning full PLL at the same time I switched to ZZ. While learning PLL my averages were steadily dropping, but this was probably mostly because I was getting used to the other parts of the ZZ solve. But now, about 6 weeks after learning the last PLL agls, my PLL is definitely faster than it was before learning to 1-look it.

In a way it is expected that your PLL times should temporarily go down while learning full PLL. If you now have 8 alsgs left to go, that's 7 new cases learned, right? The 7 cases you learned could be slightly faster already. But for the remaining 8, you currently have an extra look to see if it's a PLL case you already know, before you look for how to solve it with 2-look PLL. Recognition and execution of a new alg is never really fast either, but gets faster quickly with practice.

 

[phreaker]

Is there actually an alg allowing to solve the Aa perm when the headlights are not in front ?

Should be able to with the headlights on the side, or top, same with A(b). I do one of them with headlights on the bottom, other corner on top right, and the other is lights on the left, and the other corner top right. Works pretty well OH. I've played with doing them both from the side, but meh. I like this pair. I've played with headlights on top, and the corner to be fixed on right bottom.

Realize, I solve OH almost exclusively, when reading this. (Maybe 1 solve in 10 now a days is 2H?)

 

[JanW]

A wasted opportunity. CFOP LL skip, 19.08. Still CFOP pb single, but could have been much better. Oh well, I'll do better next time I get an LL skip, in 15000 solves...

Didn't manage to reconstruct my solve.

 

[Jason Green]

@Jason Green

Thanks ! Do you recall how much time it took before your times actually improved ?

I agree with everyone that during the time you're learning you'll be improving on other aspects so it's hard to quantify what the alg set counts for.

Say I was learning two new algs though. I'd say within about a week if those cases came up I would feel I was at least as fast as two look to recall and execute. Maybe another week and I'd feel like I was saving time, again just for those two algs. I'm going off my bad memory, but something like that. I learned PLL a lot faster than OLL.

 

[h2f]

Talking about Aperm - you can do this from any angle with headlights on any side due to fact it's always a commutator with a setup. Some of these comms are faster and easier to fingertrick and some dont. Just talking...

 

[phreaker]

Talking about Aperm - you can do this from any angle with headlights on any side due to fact it's always a commutator with a setup. Some of these comms are faster and easier to fingertrick and some dont. Just talking...

I don't commutator them. I just mirror them to the angle I want.

To be clear: I like lights on left, and bottom, for A(a) and A(b) OH right now. (Which is which I always forget.)

You'd be looking at:

Lights on left:
x' U' R U' L2 U R' U' L2 U2

In reality, there's another rotation of the cube in there for me, because I do U2 as a R2, as I do the end L2 as U2.

Lights on right:
x' U L' U R2 U' L U R2 U2

I've tried this alg.. it's not as good... Doesn't work for me, vs. lights on bottom.

Lights on bottom:
x' R U' R D2 R' U R D2 R2

Lights on top:
x' R' D R' U2 R D' R' U2 R2

I don't like this one much... It isn't "bad" but, it isn't as good as lights on left.

 

[h2f]

I don't commutator them. I just mirror them to the angle I want.

I do the same. I like A perm with x rotation and setup to D layer with R2 or R' U R' in other version (setup with cancelation) but it's personal choice. There are plenty ways A perms can be done.

Edit: I use this an the inverse: x R' U R' D2 R U' R' D2 R2 x'

 

[EvilGnome6]

Hi all. Just dropping by to share my results from AZCubing Summer 2016.

2x2 was awful. I ended up with a 10.21 average and my best single was a 6.55:

3x3 was good. I made it to the second round and got a 19.24 single and a new PB average of 22.02:

4x4 was very good. I got a new PB single of 1:04.29 and PB average of 1:09.73.

7x7 was a bit sub-par for me but considering I shaved about one and a half minutes off my last official times, I won't complain. I had a 7:01.71 mean and a 6:53 single:

 

[mark49152]

Nice solves Mike

 

[Jason Green]

Great job Mike, I'm gonna make it to one some day.

 

[teacher77]

A wasted opportunity. CFOP LL skip, 19.08. Still CFOP pb single, but could have been much better. Oh well, I'll do better next time I get an LL skip, in 15000 solves...

Didn't manage to reconstruct my solve.

The same happened to me last week and I got a crappy 24.95 s... Without the LL skip, this would have been an above average time. It's a shame that this poor solve is now my PB single.

 

[muchacho]

Very nice, Mike!

I think in every comp there is always some kid in your videos that look both surprised and happy to see how fast an oldie can be, how cute.

Regarding A-perms, these are mine, anyone use any of them? (I do for BLD and I think I like them)
Lw R D2 R' U' R D2 R' U Lw'
Lw U' R D2 R' U R D2 R' Lw'

edit: oh, it seems Grzegorz does.
edit2: maybe not.

 

[newtonbase]

Very nice, Mike!

I think in every comp there is always some kid in your videos that look both surprised and happy to see how fast an oldie can be, how cute.

Regarding A-perms, these are mine, anyone use any of them? (I do for BLD and I think I like them)
Lw R D2 R' U' R D2 R' U Lw'
Lw U' R D2 R' U R D2 R' Lw'

edit: oh, it seems Grzegorz does.

They feel nice. I've been using the same A-perms since day 1 but I've only recently realised how crappy they are.
Well done @EvilGnome6

 

[h2f]

@EvilGnome6, Mike good job!

Very nice, Mike!

I think in every comp there is always some kid in your videos that look both surprised and happy to see how fast an oldie can be, how cute.

Regarding A-perms, these are mine, anyone use any of them? (I do for BLD and I think I like them)
Lw R D2 R' U' R D2 R' U Lw'
Lw U' R D2 R' U R D2 R' Lw'

edit: oh, it seems Grzegorz does.
edit2: maybe not.

Yeah, I do them and fingertrick in the way you wrote. I wrote it in a standard way. I like comm it's based on.

 

[One Wheel]

Regarding A-perms, these are mine, anyone use any of them? (I do for BLD and I think I like them)
Lw R D2 R' U' R D2 R' U Lw'
Lw U' R D2 R' U R D2 R' Lw'

edit: oh, it seems Grzegorz does.
edit2: maybe not.

I use the second one except finish with an R2. The R' Lw' would preserve the orientation of the cube, which obviously matters more for blind than regular, but you can also finish with R2 x for the same result.

I've been working on blind, and while I haven't actually attempted a whole solve yet it feels like I'll get a successful solve in the next week and a half or two weeks. Two and a half weeks to the competition!

 

[muchacho]

Good luck, probably I won't compete in next 6 months so no hurry, but I'll try to be ready by Christmas.

 

[EvilGnome6]

I think in every comp there is always some kid in your videos that look both surprised and happy to see how fast an oldie can be, how cute.

Ha! I kept screwing up on 2x2 and the judge was happy I finally had a proper solve.