Stickerless vs Stickered

[xyzzy]

I find the QiYi shades aren't as bad as the Dayan stickerless, really used to struggle with those unless every light in the house was on.

Funny that, I have the opposite experience. The only reasonably good stickerless 3×3×3s I have are a GuHong and a Valk3, and I'd say the DaYan shades are just slightly easier to distinguish under dim lighting. (GuHong is kind of old and I don't know if their newer cubes use anything different, but presumably they don't.)

They're also both much better than my stickered Aolong v2 (with the standard shades), which used to cause me grief every time I practised with it.

 

[BirdPuzzles]

Funny that, I have the opposite experience. The only reasonably good stickerless 3×3×3s I have are a GuHong and a Valk3, and I'd say the DaYan shades are just slightly easier to distinguish under dim lighting. (GuHong is kind of old and I don't know if their newer cubes use anything different, but presumably they don't.)

They're also both much better than my stickered Aolong v2 (with the standard shades), which used to cause me grief every time I practised with it.

Yeah same. My stickerless yulong(full brights) is fine in low light. where i have an issue is the SS cubes. Ahhh the blue and green on those cubes lol.

 

[pipkiksass]

I wonder if this varies with the colour temperature (warmth) of lighting? It would make sense - clearly there's a large element of personal preference, as with all stickers and contrast, but perhaps we should all be swapping out all the light bulbs in our houses for 4500K+ "daylight" bulbs?!?!


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[pglewis]

... perhaps we should all be swapping out all the light bulbs in our houses for 4500K+ "daylight" bulbs?!?!

Yeah, this could be an XY problem. All shades are good shades if you fix the lighting.

 

[CornerCutter]

I have been doing some reading and I was wondering if there is a difference between Stickerless and Stickered cubes?

I am planning to get a Wuque 4x4 and I can't decide if I should get a stickerless because I've heard it is better?

I think I would say there is a difference.

 

[DGCubes]

Depends on the cube, but nowadays, there's generally very little difference. It's mostly down to whichever one you think looks better.

 

[Dom]

I'll have to slightly disagree with @DGCubes this time. While I agree that yes, there is a little difference, I do not think it mostly comes down to which one you think looks better. That little bit of difference can turn a slight annoyance into a major frustration. It's about how well the plastics rub against each other.

My recommendation: get both a stickered black and also a stickerless. Set them both up the same way, break them in the same amount, then let us know your side-by-side comparison in a video review. Then sell the one you like less. Sell it at the next comp you go to. It'll probably sell for exactly how much you bought it for.

 

[pglewis]

It's a very small sample size, but the cubes I have in both stickerless and black plastic do feel subtlety different from one another.

A bigger factor for my decision personally is the fact that I'm not keen on restickering puzzles bigger than 3x3. My current policy is stickerless only for 4x4 and up.

 

[pipkiksass]

@pglewis, another vote for no more restickering big cubes!!!

I have 2 cubes in both stickerless and stickered (Weilong V2 and Valk 3), and from that tiny sample I'd say there's 3 factors in play: recognition, feel, and plastic quality.

Recog first - with stickerless cubes you can't choose your preferred shades, but contrast isn't an issue. There used to be posts on here, in the Dayan days, about the different contrast between stickers and plastic on black/white/undyed plastic. Again, not an issue on stickerless cubes. I think some will prefer stickers, some stickerless, in the same way as some can solve on a purple cube with silver stickers, others can't!

In terms of feel, I mean the physical feeling of the stickers on the cubies, rather than the feel when turning. Stickered cubes are more tactile, and perhaps easier to grip. Stickerless feel smoother and, in an odd way, smaller. I particularly get this with my Valks, when going back to stickered from stickerless (main), the cube feels less small, and there's an odd (but not unpleasant) feeling from the stickers under my fingertips.

Thirdly, plastic quality. We all know that dying plastic affects it in many ways. Natural plastic Dayan cubes were popular for this reason (among others). It affects the sensation of the cube when turning, as plastic on plastic friction will be different. For me, stickerless cubes feel like the plastic is slightly thinner. This may be a placebo caused by the lack of a physical layer of vinyl, it may be just me, or it may be an actual thing!! For 4x4+, I think stickerless cubes feel slightly scratchy "out of the box", but breaking in seems to have more of an effect on them than stickered, and they become smoother as you rack up the solves. On this subject, I'd imagine the quantity of lube required would also vary, but that's a whole other can of worms...

So for me there are at least 3 significant differences. Whether stickered or stickerless is better will be a subjective choice on the part of each cyber.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[asacuber]

I know that for the thunderclap(sorry, don't know about the WuQue) the stickerless version had softer plastic I think.

 

[Luke8]

Hi, I have a stickerless GouGuan YueXiao, and I plan to get only stickerless cubes for the rest of my cubing career. This seems like an obvious choice for me: no peels/chips and no restickering. Yet for an unknown reason, I see the pro cubers and many other cubers use stickered cubes. Is there any reason to them using stickers? Thanks for the help.

 

[One Wheel]

I know that for the thunderclap(sorry, don't know about the WuQue) the stickerless version had softer plastic I think.

I got a stickerless thunderclap for my nephew and I really liked it, so I got a black one for myself. They are very different. It seems to me that the black one is significantly softer.

Hi, I have a stickerless GouGuan YueXiao, and I plan to get only stickerless cubes for the rest of my cubing career. This seems like an obvious choice for me: no peels/chips and no restickering. Yet for an unknown reason, I see the pro cubers and many other cubers use stickered cubes. Is there any reason to them using stickers? Thanks for the help.

I think there are two things, maybe more:
1. Grip on the edges of the stickers
2. Custom shades (better recognition optimized for you, rather than just most people)
Other possible considerations: black border (or white) may help recognition, Feliks uses Gans cubes, which don't come in stickerless. I know he uses stickerless cubes for bigger puzzles. I think Kevin Hayes prefers stickered cubes so he can have his own color scheme, but Yuxin is making tiled cubes now, and not black.

 

[4Chan]

I got a stickerless thunderclap for my nephew and I really liked it, so I got a black one for myself. They are very different. It seems to me that the black one is significantly softer.



I think there are two things, maybe more:
1. Grip on the edges of the stickers
2. Custom shades (better recognition optimized for you, rather than just most people)
Other possible considerations: black border (or white) may help recognition, Feliks uses Gans cubes, which don't come in stickerless. I know he uses stickerless cubes for bigger puzzles. I think Kevin Hayes prefers stickered cubes so he can have his own color scheme, but Yuxin is making tiled cubes now, and not black.

One of the weirdest things in the cube industry is like... companies HAVE a black option, but don't offer it commercially.

Kevin actually has multiple black yuxin big cubes.
I know a few people who would prefer those, because of the shades, but they're not released (to my knowledge)

 

[AlphaSheep]

I very much prefer stickered (specifically black) cubes for two reasons:

1. The black border makes the colors pop which improves recognition
2. The raised stickers give my fingers better grip.

I'm not very fussy about colours, so I've stuck with the factory stickers on all of my cubes. I've never had to resticker a cube and I've never had a problem with stickers chipping, except for some small chips on my SS Skewb (which was only after 15000 solves).

 

[One Wheel]

One of the weirdest things in the cube industry is like... companies HAVE a black option, but don't offer it commercially.

Kevin actually has multiple black yuxin big cubes.
I know a few people who would prefer those, because of the shades, but they're not released (to my knowledge)

Darghhh! That is frustrating! Are they black, or do they have black tiles with stickers on top? I remember seeing a video of CBC dying a stickerless Zhanchi before stickerless cubes were comp legal. I'm guessing it might be possible to do the same with yuxin big cube tiles.

 

[4Chan]

Darghhh! That is frustrating! Are they black, or do they have black tiles with stickers on top? I remember seeing a video of CBC dying a stickerless Zhanchi before stickerless cubes were comp legal. I'm guessing it might be possible to do the same with yuxin big cube tiles.

Hmm, now I'm not sure ):

I want to guess, it's black tiles with stickers.

 

[MoyuDayanLover3]

I personally prefer to use stickerless cubes. Not that black (or white) cubes screw up my recognition, but I like the feel and look of stickerless ones more. For example, two of my previous mains have been stickerless, the zhanchi and valk, and I would probably still be using the valk if it weren't for a certain incident that disabled me from using it.

 

[dskids]

I wonder if this varies with the colour temperature (warmth) of lighting?

Bingo. I had to replace the orange stickers on all my QiYi puzzles because the lighting in my living room is a warmer yellow color. Even with all the lights on I would still get the orange and red stickers mixed up sometimes. I never had this issue with dim natural light which is whiter/bluer in hue.

 

[T1_M0]

I've done just over 3000 solves with my stickered thunderclap and I love the shades and the black outlining. However most of my edge pieces' stickers have started to peel off and time to time, my left index finger gets caught there. It's so annoying when the sharp sticker gets under my nail and does a cut there.:confused: That has sometimes been a bit disabling 'cause it hurts for a day or two.

I've now ordered new stickers and also a new stickerless thunderclap. I don't currently own any stickerless cubes, let's see if I'll like that better...

 

[Phoenix]

I've been looking at some fast solvers and i seem to find mixed opinions.
I'm planning on buying a wuque, wondering what upsides and downsides there is, going with stickerless puzzles.

I would like to hear your thoughts on this, as i only have a single budget stickerless puzzle, yet i see fast cubers using stickerless on their big cubes.

Obviously there is a slight difference in grip with stickers and the shades are different, but i've been wondering if there is any difference in the performance and/or feel from stickerless to a stickered puzzles?