Introduction
As the speedcubing market grows and as there are more and more puzzles coming in stock for you to pick one from it’s becoming quite a hard choice to make whenever you want to purchase a good speed cube for yourself.
There can be cubes that are cheap and bad, and cubes that are expensive and worth the price, while on the other hand there can be cubes that are not at all expensive but show an extraordinary performance as well as cubes that cost too much but are a total failure.
It is worth noting that liking and disliking the cube is subjective as different people have different grips, different turning styles, and finger tricks, as well as different momentum during the solves.
Importance of Good Speed Cubes
As these days there are a lot of advancements in solving methods and finger tricks, it is important for an active speedcuber to be up to date with them, and although some people might say that what cube you use does not matter that much as long as you have any decent magnet cube, in my opinion not having a speed cube which is ideal for your specific kind of turning can be the cause of a downfall as it could prohibit you from trying advanced new finger tricks and lavish algorithms which could include S and M slices or wide moves or just some fancy moves which are quite rare but can help you improve your solves by a lot.
Also, in my opinion, the cube which suits your turning more than any other cube could simply just help you improve your times as there are lesser chances of lockups and bizarre stuff like the cube slipping off your hands when you spam tps, and it could just make you feel a lot better while you are practicing, and a positive attitude could just make it easier for you to improve.
Now when we talk about having a cube suitable for your turning style. We can take two points into consideration:
- The cube itself
- The setup on the cube
The Speedcube
When we speak about the cube itself, we are talking about several factors like its weight, magnetic strength, corner cutting, speed, and its feel in general. Firstly, you should know for yourself what magnitude of these factors suit you, then there are several ways of figuring out which puzzle satisfies most of these conditions for you. You can try out puzzles from different cubers at competitions and then choose one which you like, or you can simply watch reviews from popular cubing channels that do reviews, like J PERM, CubeHead, Tingman, etc.
The Set Up
Now the setup is an extremely important point as well. A lot of cubes which I would say are extremely reliable aren’t actually that impressive straight out of the box, but require a specific kind of setup. Earlier people didn’t have many options, you would have to open up the entire cube to change the springs and I don’t think changing magnet strength was even a thing back then.
Although now, we do have a lot of liberty with the help of the advanced adjustable springs/maglev, screws, and magnet strength systems being present in the new puzzles. Here you can watch videos on YouTube and see different set-ups that popular cubers use and experiment around by trying the same ones on your cubes. I would say that generally people with the same turning styles, would prefer a similar kind of setup.
For example, I like mid-high spring/maglev settings, with the screws neither being too loose nor too tight, strong magnets, and light lube. Now I have a bit of a stiff grip, and my turning is quite fast. So if there is a person with a similar kind of turning style like mine, it is most likely that he would prefer a setup similar to that mine.
Now when you are going to buy cubes, don’t go just by face value because I have seen some very attractive expensive cubes which turn out to be disappointing and some pale cheap-looking puzzles which could just end up becoming your main.
Here are some things which you can keep in mind about different features:
- High springs/maglev settings make the cube slower but rather stable, while light spring settings keep the cube faster but flimsy
- Light lubes make the cube swift and fast, while heavy lubes make them slow but do the job of stabilizing your turning, but this is after you break in.
- Strong magnets keep those layers intact which you aren’t moving at the moment but they also give a slight feeling of slowness, it’s like you can feel those magnetic pulls after every turn. The lighter magnetic settings don’t help much in keeping the layers intact, but they don’t give a slow feeling either.
Now, you must be having an idea of how different speed cube preferences work, and which cube could be fitting for you. If you aren’t exactly sure about how the set-up processes work then you also have some ready-made choices right at your fingertips, like the cubelelo elite services, which set up the puzzle at the store and then send it to you, in which case you won’t have to do much work.
This way here and there you can learn about all the different permutations of magnitudes of features like speed, weight, spring/maglev, magnetic strength, corner cutting, etc.
Check out 3x3 speed cubes
It could take some time for you to understand what is the best for you, and at that time, it wouldn’t exactly be the price and hype for the cube, but instead the quality and experience the cube provides to you while you cube.
About Author
Hasnain Reza Bilal
Hasnain Reza Bilal is a speedcuber from Hyderabad. He started Speedcubing during 2019 when he was around 12-13 years of age. Apart from speedcubing he likes reading, and photography. His main events are 3x3 and 5x5. He has been to one competition pre COVID and 2 competitions post COVID and has won 2 gold medals, 1 silver medal and 2 bronze medals in the post COVID competitions.
