Coogam GAN 356 R S Speed Cube Gans 356R 3x3 Stickerless Gan356 RS 3x3x3 Speedcube GES V3 System

This is a review for the new GAN 356R that is set to debut worldwide on November 5, 2018. I jumped on the bandwagon very early, literally the day it became available on Amazon via Prime 1-Day shipping. The other alternative is to place orders for China shipment, which will take a month if you are lucky. There was a small window of opportunity to buy this on speedcubeshop.com but they quickly sold out and I missed the boat. This is an entry level cube that is being offered as a direct replacement for the GAN 356S V2. The cube out of the box is lubed and tensioned basically perfectly. The cube is typical GAN, excellent fit, finish and attention to detail, despite being the one of the least expensive entry to a GAN puzzle. The turning is smooth and fast, faster than I prefer. I have the GAN Air SM and the GAN 354M for comparison. I also have the GAN 356X on preorder at the cubicle. It comes only with default GES V3 yellow nuts installed, which is what I default to anyways, and the majority of people seem to do as well for the popular GAN GES puzzles. In the box, the puzzle is simply inserted along with the thick GAN pamphlet and plastic GES tri-nut tensioner tool. Overlying the set is a familiar blue velvet GAN cube carrying bag, a very nice touch. There are no other nut options, though, you can buy a set of GES nuts easily enough very cheaply. The price point at $17-$18 means basically no alternative GES nuts, and notably no clear plastic box that you might expect with other GAN puzzles. I found that my typical GAN GES setup, which includes applying Traxxas 30K to the nuts liberally provided enough velvety smooth turning slowdown to make the cube very controllable. The GAN 354M is a fair direct comparison but the two cubes are completely different beasts. In comparison, the 354M seems much faster and it did not take so much lube to slow the 356R down by comparison. Something to keep in mind, as it would be very possible to overlube the 356R and then it would be a chore to clean out those nuts. Let's now dive into the design of the cube specifically. The most notable and most apparent is the consequences of the key areas in which GAN is moving their design philosophy, mainly, the extensive honeycombing between friction points, the seamless contact surfaces, and the move to snap joints in the individual color panels on this cube, which comes only in the stickerless configuration. This has significant effects on the feel of the cube: fast, smooth, and quiet. These are all delivered in spades. That's exactly what you will get with this cube. Unfortunately, there is a very real problem with the use of the snap joint color panels on the assembly and where they interface with the seams on the cubies. When turning the cube, you might experience a clicking / catching sensation. I actually bought two 356R cubes, and returned one due to excessive clicking and catching. The one I decided to keep exhibited this problem much less, on just a couple of faces. The way I was able to eliminate this completely was to gently shave off a hair of excess plastic where the colored panel interfaces with the black internal plastic on the cubie on the middle layer. Any clicking or catching happens between the top or bottom layer sliding past the middle layer (or to phrase it differently, where the left or right layer slides past the middle layer). By scraping away a hair of plastic at the edge of the middle layer panels, this will eliminate the catching or clicking sensations completely. The tolerances on a GAN puzzle are very tight and precise, but for this particular cube, you might note a catching problem when the edge of the color panel overhangs the black internal support. Finally, one last comment about the color scheme. The best cube to directly compare this one to is teh 354M. Unlike the GAN 354M, which has a "full bright" stickerless color scheme that is a joy to behold, the GAN 356R has a standard color scheme that is very dull by comparison and particularly the green shade is just really bordering on a turquoise color that is not as nice as the 354M. I posted a picture to compare the colors on both cubes. Overall, the GAN 356R has a lot going for it that makes it a good buy particularly at the price point of $17-$18. It's a solid performer that has some quirks as noted above, with the mechanism and the choice of colors.

Pros: This GAN cube is very stable and smooth. Even without magnets, this is a great cube for beginners and intermediate cubers. The hexagonal grid system on the bottom of the corner and edge pieces help with stability and control with the cube. Also, the tensioning mechanism works great if you ever want to adjust between tight and loose. If it is loose, then it will turn really fast, but if it is tighter, then it will be more stable. I would not exactly say that this cube is a budget cube, however, it is surely one of the most excellent non-magnetic cubes on the market. Cons: The GAN 356R is a great cube, though if you are looking for the best cubes, you might as well go along with the 356X, 354, or Air SM. Sometimes, during fast algorithms, especially in PLL, the cube will lock up. You can adjust the tightness to try to help with this problem, but sometimes it just doesn't work. Overall, this cube is great and I would definitely recommend to buy!

This quality is great. If you are looking for a 1st speed cube I would say get one with magnets. This was my 1st speed cube and found that this cube is easy to turn that I find myself focusing more on keeping the cube a cube rather than solving the puzzle. I very quickly ordered a magnetic cube (next day) and now truly understand that there is more to a speed cube than easy turning. I have also found that I am not able to tune the cube to the setting that I have come to like on the other GAN magnetic cubes. I love this cube and use it for improving my turning accuracy but will always have a magnetic cube as my main now that I have experience magnets. If this cube is the price range you are looking for I believe that you will be more pleased with a magnetic cube of lesser quality, rather than this cube of great quality but no magnets.

Its a great cube, feels very smooth but can be unstable when you go too fast so i would recommend adding magnets But overall Good cube

I'm very new at cubing. I'm still learning CFOP, and only started once this cube arrived, and I'm glad I waited. I was gifted a rubix cube, and going back to it now I'm not even sure how I dealt with the sound. Its ridiculously loud, and difficult to turn. I digress, this GAN speedcube was a night and day difference from the first turn. Its smooth. Real smooth. Corner cutting is good as far as I can tell, but keep in mind this is my first (and so far, only) ACTUAL speed cube purchase. The only negative, and this could honestly be my lack of skill rather than the cube itself, is the cube can get 'unstable' sometimes, and I struggle to keep the rows in alignment. Good corner cutting kinda negates this, but I sometimes feel I lose control seemingly at random. Could just be me though.

i love my gan cube. my dog ended up leaving my cube handicapped, but i still use it with a faulty and missing piece. super fast and smooth, good cube to get fast and learn how to solve.

This cube is nice, light weight, easy and fast to turn and cuts corners nicely. It is not magnetic, but I plan to do that shortly. Easy to take apart and reassemble as well. Stickerless and the the colors are nice and bright. I plan on purchasing a couple more of these cubs.

Kiddo loves this because it's smooth and can be moved fast. Good fidget toy when not trying to work it out. Overall great.

Fast delivery, exactly as described, It has improved my time massivly, flawless cube.

I knew it wouldnt be great as the 60$ magnetic cubes, but it offers good value for the money, is very smooth, but avoid getting sand or dirt in it as it is a bit of a pain to disassemble! Also if you try disassembling it, the nuts can jump all over the place a be tough to find. Its fun thats its customizeable even if they didnt provide alternate GES nuts. The blue bag was missing, I almost didnt notice, but amazon customer service gave me a refund of a few dollars to compensate for the bag (I got enough to justify not returning it to get a bag on a new order) Really satisfied with the product, will order a more expensive magnetic version if I get to have averages of 15sec and less. The provided Speed cubing chart is totally usefull, I have never wanted to learn those algorithms in over 10 years of cubing before finding this as a surprise with this item. The chart shows about 100-120 very handy algorithms, of course alternate versions of these algoriths are all over the place on the web, but the chart really makes it easy, and is a good reference without needing an internet connection, it has been on my drawer in my bedroom for the last few weeks, not 1 day has passed without me trying to memrize some algorithms, I now know 2 new algorithms by heart and it saves me about 1-2 seconds per solve on average (just a rough estimate) to know these 2!

My son is happy and satisfied with this speed cube

This cube if very comfort and a very nice design the corner cutting oh dont even think about that the corner cutting are the best. I bought this and this is very nice i recommend buying this. The other thing is the packaging it is so good and so smooth. But the cube should be magnetic but idk why they didnt put any . but So all so good. This is very good. There should be a bag too.

This is the best cube I ever had. No stickers, smooth surface, feels really nice in your hand. And great cornering angle.