sdc100 wrote:I'm surprised that Woot chose to sell this Yellow set, when Christmas is coming up. They've sold a Red and Green(Teal) set for $29.99 that is much more chromatically appropriate for the season. Even the Gold and Silver sets are more festive. Then again, Woot is an overstock/liquidation seller, and they sell whatever is available.

As you can see by the icon on the lower right, the Red/Green was previously sold around Christmas.

This is woot. Don't underestimate their ability to sell buckyballs again soon. I'm just wondering when the world will get saturated with buckyballs considering how often these are sold. Then I thought of this;

Oh boy, more Buckyballs...

I needed a few more sets to go in with my collection of Dyson vacuum cleaners.

I just bought 3 for the price of 2 on ThinkGeek... I come here 20 minutes later and boom 2 for 1... FML could have had one free!

The smartpost logo says arrives by Christmas. Take note, they don't specify which year Christmas ;)

sdc100 wrote:I'm surprised that Woot chose to sell this Yellow set, when Christmas is coming up. They've sold a Red and Green(Teal) set for $29.99 that is much more chromatically appropriate for the season. Even the Gold and Silver sets are more festive. Then again, Woot is an overstock/liquidation seller, and they sell whatever is available.

As you can see by the icon on the lower right, the Red/Green was previously sold around Christmas.

Yeah, the cases are red & green, but who cares? You'll never get them back into a cube shape, so you end up throwing the cases away. ;)

Buckyball quality magnets at this price have pretty much always been available on eBay. Just search "216 magnet 5mm"
But if you ever become serious about magnet spheres, go to youtube to figure out what you should buy. Hint: it's not buckyballs.

These stupid things again?! Why? Who wants this dust collector item?

cindihoward wrote:Each ball is about $0.0925 cents each (with shipping)! Case is free.

Or each case is $19.995 (with shipping) and the magnetic balls are free!

I dearly love woot but I'm so sick of seeing these.

I'm such a sucker for stuff like this.

Hope these taste better than the last set of buckyballs. Those ones gave me indigestion somethin' fierce.

I bought the patriotic set of these awhile back while stationed in the middle east. They sat on my desk for awhile until we realized that they would stick to the dry erase board when tossed from across the room. Good times were had.

MagickalMan wrote:Some are held for charity, and some for fancy dress, but when they're held for pleasure they're the ones that I like best.

i got the most magnetic balls of them all

Boring for me, but at least better than those crummy batteries. KEEP these magnets AWAY from PETS and DUMB KIDS! DO NOT INGEST!

indianpimptx wrote:they charge tax!

Try the coupon code "TAXSUCKS" on orders over $40.

jymgardner wrote:This is probably the best color choice. I bought a couple og the green ones several months back and the green coating is already peeling off. Consider this before buying these with any other color. Just my opinion.

JG

Doesn't matter what color. I have the color and the silver was peeling off and the balls were getting rough and scratchy the next day after playing with them a couple of hours.

sdblair wrote:Yeah, the cases are red & green, but who cares? You'll never get them back into a cube shape, so you end up throwing the cases away. ;)

They make it look so easy in the video... Mine haven't seen a cube shape (or anything even closely representative) since I got them...

Product Warning: KEEP AWAY FROM ALL CHILDREN! Do not put in nose or mouth. Swallowed magnets can stick together across intestines causing serious infections and death. Seek medical attention if magnets are swallowed or inhaled. Buckyballs should be kept away from electrical or magnetic devices, including but not limited to credit cards, hard drives, or pacemakers. If a Buckyball should become damaged or cracked, discontinue use immediately.

ALSO IMPORTANT TO NOTE:
Warning: Pregnant women, the elderly, and children under 10 should avoid prolonged exposure to Happy Fun Ball.
Caution: Happy Fun Ball may suddenly accelerate to dangerous speeds.
Happy Fun Ball contains a liquid core, which, if exposed due to rupture, should not be touched, inhaled, or looked at.
Do not use Happy Fun Ball on concrete.
Discontinue use of Happy Fun Ball if any of the following occurs:
itching
vertigo
dizziness
tingling in extremities
loss of balance or coordination
slurred speech
temporary blindness
profuse sweating
heart palpitations
If Happy Fun Ball begins to smoke, get away immediately. Seek shelter and cover head.
Happy Fun Ball may stick to certain types of skin.
When not in use, Happy Fun Ball should be returned to its special container and kept under refrigeration. Failure to do so relieves the makers of Happy Fun Ball, Wacky Products Incorporated, and its parent company, Global Chemical Unlimited, of any and all liability.
Ingredients of Happy Fun Ball include an unknown glowing substance which fell to Earth, presumably from outer space.
Happy Fun Ball has been shipped to our troops in Saudi Arabia and is also being dropped by our warplanes on Iraq.
Do not taunt Happy Fun Ball.
Happy Fun Ball comes with a lifetime guarantee.

Just a warning, but my fiancee and I had a vague soreness in our hands after handling these for 15-20 minutes. It's not like we were pinching or holding them tightly, so all I could figure was that the strong magnetism had something to do with it. That may sound silly, and I don't know if anyone else has experienced that effect or not, but I wanted to put that out there.

I saw a "demo" set in Brookstone that had been out for a few weeks. Most of the balls were still there, but the shape was so mangled by this time that I found it hard to believe that anyone could create anything cool from such a jumbled mess. I watched the youtube video and was left with the impression that your ability to form intelligible shapes depends entirely on the original shape of the object. That is, it's easy to form nice shapes from a cube, but not so much from an amorphous mass. I was concerned that after a few attempts, mine would look that way and the whole thing would be rendered useless. That's what made me wonder if these were worth buying. Does anyone have any opinions about this?

Newegg.com has the holiday version on sale today for $24.50:

link

My 3 yr old daughter wants to know if these come in strawberry flavour.

Looks like it was even cheaper a while back on woot - http://mywoot.net/past/details.php?id=3568

Ah! Wonderful... been waiting for a good deal on these to come up again.

I've come up with some new (to me) shapes to build with, but I simply don't have nearly enough buckyballs to complete any cool structures with them.

We'll see if "in for 3" can solve that. :D

This isn't a bag of marbles - those folks who want to make cool shapes will have to work at it. If it were easy they would be boring. For marble lovers, stick with watching the YouTube videos of these.

There are lots of fakes out there with mixed reviews. At least these are the originals.

Love the Star Trek connection, thanks whatsamamatteru!

Buckyballs! I waited all woot-off for you!!!

I'm not thrilled with the price hike, but thanks to jumbowoot I can still end up with a great buy!!

In for 1. Now I am no longer a geek without bucky balls. FYI A geek without a bucky ball set is like a jock without a strap.

hcir wrote:I saw a "demo" set in Brookstone that had been out for a few weeks. Most of the balls were still there, but the shape was so mangled by this time that I found it hard to believe that anyone could create anything cool from such a jumbled mess. I watched the youtube video and was left with the impression that your ability to form intelligible shapes depends entirely on the original shape of the object. That is, it's easy to form nice shapes from a cube, but not so much from an amorphous mass. I was concerned that after a few attempts, mine would look that way and the whole thing would be rendered useless. That's what made me wonder if these were worth buying. Does anyone have any opinions about this?

Absolutely. You use individual balls to create different shaped building blocks with which the only limit is your imagination.

I have a hard time justifying spending over 20 bucks for a pair of magnetic ball sets.

if i'm looking for something to screw off with at work, a smartphone will entertain me for a guaranteed 8-12 hours a day.

Why not the Christmas-themed versions in Red and Green? They'd go great with all the other colors I've collected from Woot over the past few months.

Just a note about rare earth magnets. If these were made of solid neodymium, they would be worth more than their weight in gold. A small percentage of neodymium is alloyed with iron in a ceramic (ferrite) form and then plated with iron. That is why they are fragile and lose their shape if allowed to smash together. I would suspect that the effects on the hands mentioned above are really due to the unusual amount of force required to separate the magnets. These are really cool, but must be handled with great care. Treat them like they were made of glass (like they sort of are).

If you're wondering how to create shapes with BuckyBalls, I HIGHLY recommend the Big Book of Bucky, available on their website.

(Unless you picked up the pink breast cancer support versions earlier from Woot - those had a Big Book of Bucky provided as part of the bundle.)

It's a primer on forming different shapes - it won't tell you everything, but it gives you a starting point.

sdc100 wrote:I'm surprised that Woot chose to sell this Yellow set, when Christmas is coming up. They've sold a Red and Green(Teal) set for $29.99 that is much more chromatically appropriate for the season. Even the Gold and Silver sets are more festive. Then again, Woot is an overstock/liquidation seller, and they sell whatever is available.

As you can see by the icon on the lower right, the Red/Green was previously sold around Christmas.

Yes, but the balls themselves aren't holiday colored - only the cases. We need red and green colored BuckyBalls themselves!

Costner wrote:Thankfully they come with carrying cases, because the last thing you need is to worry about magnetic balls just flying all over the place.

I mean it isn't like they stick together or anything and I'm sure they fly around and just haphazardly pop off and go rolling across the floor waiting to trip your boss the next time he steps foot into your cubicle.

Oh wait.

These things are VERY magnetic - don't think you'd have to worry about them flying about on their own unless you have very strong random magnetic fields flying about your environment.

Mydnyte wrote:These things are VERY magnetic - don't think you'd have to worry about them flying about on their own unless you have very strong random magnetic fields flying about your environment.

I cant ewait to play with my balls!

I’m convinced that if I play with these long enough, I will discover perpetual motion.

Enough already of the buckyballs. How many times have they been offered this year? 5?

It's actually pretty easy to get it back into a cube. I have the black Sidekick Buckyballs (Sidekicks have 125 instead of 216) and it came with instructions on how to make the cube as well as a couple simple shapes like the triangle and hexagon. I would assume the regular pack would have the same.

cindihoward wrote:Each ball is about $0.0925 cents each (with shipping)! Case is free.

EXTREME math fail. 3999 cents / 216 = 18.5 cents ea. At first I thought you might be telling us how many DOLLARS apiece they were, but after that I think you then went on to divide by 2 for unknown reasons as well.

I decided to get into magnetic ball toys a year ago, and was getting nanospheres (231 balls/set) for as low as $18 plus shipping. I got 5 sets for $100. (1155 balls for 10000 cents = 8.7 cents ea) Good deal back before the china-rare-earth-scare. Tricky to find 216 size sets for under $30 lately. I currently have 9 sets and can make very complex large shapes.

Random wisdom: not for children or pets, obviously, two magnets in your gut at once can be life-threatening. The nickel-plated (MATTE silver) is the most durable by far, the other colored coatings tend to flake off and chip. Different brands can be different sizes, do NOT mix brands unless you know they are exactly the same size. Check out youtube for construction ideas. You will always want more balls to build more complex shapes so buy as many sets at once as you can justify to save on shipping costs, I recommend getting 3 here.

virtual1one wrote: but after that I think you then went on to divide by 2 for unknown reasons as well.

This woot is 2 sets of buckyballs.

Is the magnetic field powerful enough to erase my memory?