Life In 19x19

badukJr wrote:I have pretty big hands, I hate playing with smaller stones. I cannot grip them. I wish bigger stones were more readily available.

What do you think you'd call big? My 9.0mm are certainly large. I've held 11mm at a congress. Can't imagine playing with them. Like boulders. I'd be afraid to drop them too easily, the famous Bomb Tesuji.

I am inexperienced enough to not yet have a preferred stone size, which means that coupled with my love of collecting game gear in general, I am acquiring various combinations of sizes and materials in an attempt to find out what I like best.

I've had a little experience with 8mm glass, and now I am anxious to try out much thicker stones (10mm, 11.6mm). I figure that once I determine what size I like best, I can then invest in a nice set of slate & shell stones. So far I am liking my new 10mm plastic ING stones a lot more than my 8mm glass stones.

bogiesan wrote:

badukJr wrote:I have pretty big hands, I hate playing with smaller stones. I cannot grip them. I wish bigger stones were more readily available.

What do you think you'd call big? My 9.0mm are certainly large. I've held 11mm at a congress. Can't imagine playing with them. Like boulders. I'd be afraid to drop them too easily, the famous Bomb Tesuji.

I think 11 is nice. I like the thickness of single convex too, but I can't pick them up from the board at all.

On a piano I span an octave and four whole steps.

zslane wrote:I figure that once I determine what size I like best, I can then invest in a nice set of slate & shell stones.
So far I am liking my new 10mm plastic ING stones a lot more than my 8mm glass stones.

Yes, it takes time to find out your favorite size.
After you have some experience with thickness closer to 11mm (Size 38 = 10.7mm), I think you'll like it better than 10mm. Let us know.

When I bought my first set of slate and shell, I was aiming at a combination of price and value. The seller in HK let me handle samples of 6 different sizes they sold. They told me to find the one with the best feel for myself. I liked size 34 the best at the time but ended up with size 33 moon which was the closest to the budget I set at the time.

Part of me would love to have a set of stones in every even-numbered size from 30 to 40, but that would just be silly, right?

I ordered a set of 10 mm ING stones (request: without the ING bowls) from Yutopian
on Sunday Jan 20, 2013; and ordered 5 Go books from Kiseido on Monday Jan 21, 2013.
(To take advantage of their 15% off plus free shipping on 5 or more English Go books.)
The ING stones and 4 of the 5 Go books arrived today Jan 24, 2013 in the same package.
The ING stones came with 182 Black and 183 White.
First impression is the ING stones are FANTASTIC for the weekly coffee shop club meet.

Thanks for the photos, always appreciated.
I enjoyed the ING stones tremendously but I really didn't need the six sets I bought back from the Go Congress in Seattle (1996?). So it was my pleasure to give them away to go newbies. Two of those guys disappeared and took the stones with them. Bummer. Two others acquired additional equipment and passed their INGs on to yet newer newbies and the other two are still using theirs.