That's how I always "solve" mine....

You can always just peel the stickers off... I did that to my father's when I was about 4, he was pissed because obviously it throws everything off...

I know that there is an official website by that Asian guy who was on beauty and the geek a couple of seasons ago. i know that there is a 7 part video or something out there...

my sister made a robot that could solve the cube some time ago...

check

+ Watch video

So thats why there was a hammer in the packedging with my rubiks cube!

Just the flat head screwdriver and a twist of the wrist pops it apart in a re-assemble-able way, sheesh.

Babies.

I'm holding out for the $2K Optimus Maximus Rubik Cube with customizable OLED squares. Solved in one-second flat. :)

@strider_mt2k: yep, that was how I solved my first one;-) Takes longer than 6 seconds, though. Actually it takes also longer than to solve it algorithmically. My personal record was something in the upwards vicinity of 1 minute. Long ago;-) Currently I can count myself lucky if I manage to solve it at all.

At the rate this is being Digged, this may be your biggest homepager yet.

They like things simple and to the point

[digg.com]

The fun thing is to take it apart, turn a corner piece, put it back together, then scramble it up. Can never be solved.

@TommySez: there are people in asylums because of you.

If anyone cares...

you don't have to be a genius to solve the cube, you just have to be a dork and have a lot of free time to practice.

Find a system, start slow, and in 3-6 months you'll be solving it in under 3 minutes.

I've taught 10 year olds so it can't be that tough.

There's no way I can get to my garage to get a hammer in under one second.

@huggy:

How is she btw?

My old manager could complete a Rubik's Cube in under a minute legit. Before I saw him do it, I didn't even think such a feat was possible, but then he's ranked in something like the top 50 (maybe better) in the world and has been doing it since the toy came out.

@Tayng: You tryin' to holla!?

@djdare: That's how my cousin solved it.

Kobayashi Maru points for creative problem solving...

I like this way. I can solve one, but it takes about 5 minutes. Maybe Art.Lebedev should make one with OLEDS...the Optimus Cube!

yea.. "solve"

Back when it first came out I could take one apart and put it back together in about a minute & 1/2. That's the James T. Kirk solution (my little brother just switched the stickers)

@GOKER@GOKOR: I'm sure your manager claims to be within the top 50, but the pros do it in about 12 seconds, have a look at [lar5.com] to see how fast most of the cube can be completed.

Back in '82 my personal best was 2 min 15 sec. Now, I'd need the hammer.

the wife can solve one in about 2 minutes, it was kind of a turn on when we first started dating.

I can show a video of myself solving a rubiks in 6 seconds. In fact, anybody can do it.

Step 1: Take a solved Rubiks and a webcam.
Step 2: Record yourself in 6 seconds descrambling the Rubiks.
Step 3: Take a video editor and reverse the video.
Step 4: Post it on YouTube.

Voila!

@GOKOR: Gommie's right, under a minute is nothing special in rubiks' land. Sure, its impressive for someone who hasn't seen it before, but the reality is that anyone can solve a cube in a minute if they take the time to learn.

My average is around 52 seconds and I wouldn't be allowed to step foot in a cube competition until I got under 30. The records are south of 10 seconds.

A minute is really only noteworthy if he had a blindfold on.

[www.chrisandkori.us]

Oh yeah? I beat that record for 5 sec. last year!

@ripfire4: I think u mean scrambling the rubik's cube, not descrambling...

Anyway, good show!

@immumo: Ahh Right! My mind must've been running backwards ahead of time. :)

thats not solving, thats braking

strange. I've been doing a lot of cubing this week, and just this morning came across a youtube video of a guy "smashing" the world record for rubik's cube.

I'm not sure if I can peal and restick all the stickers in under 6 seconds.

this deserves its own Gizmodo page:
[granades.com]

taking it apart is much better than taking the stickers off. You can only take the stickers off and redo them a couple of times, but you can take the thing apart and put it back together tons of times. And the benefit, each time you take it apart and put it back to gether, it gets looser and easier to turn

Mine is more efficient. I skip steps 1-4 and go directly to step 5. That saves me 4 seconds.

Why dont you just take it apart and re build it with the pieces in order???
Thats what we all do.
well thats what i do. I'd rather waste $15 and check my building skills than spend $15 just to check my demolition skills.
Unless its something fun like tossing it a cars or trucks or something of the sort.

@TommySez: Haha, you obviously don't know how to solve them.

You can re-arrange every cube, except the the center cubes, then put it back together and it'll be solved just as easily as if you muddled it up by hand.

BTW, I was pretty amazed at school when someone was able to do it in under five minutes, but after checking youtube, there's really nothing to it.

We taught the whole class to do them and some people got down to under a minute.

Move onto the 4x4 and 5x5 if you want a challenge ;-)

I can solve one in less than twenty seconds, consistently. I've been cubing for about a year.

@djdare: Umm, if you put the right colored stickers on each side, making solid sides, it doesn't mess anything up.

Agreed. It's very simple to solve the cube. All it takes it 4 stages with 2 different algorithms per stage. It's just memorization and practice. Took me 3 weeks of practice from watching videos on youtube. Now it only takes me about 2 min to solve.

2 years it took for me to solve mine ... I displayed it on my shelf for 2 weeks ... then it met the hammer! My friend Krazy glued his nephew's cube, just to be mean.

*cries* you dissapoint me Giz...why must people think that the only way to solve is to destroy it?

you know what? just to show you how cool cubes can be, lemme show you one of my favorite ones. It's a one of a kind, so dont think you can go to the store and get one:
[i157.photobucket.com]

GOKOR:i know it's already been said, but under a minute is definatly not in the top 50. my WCA record is 40+, and i'm barley under 1000.

Carefully pry up and middle square. With enough careful force it will pop out and from there you can remove all of the blocks and replace then inthe correct order.
Probably take more than a minute, but it does the job.