Shuffling machines and blackjack

[Edenfield99]

My local casino has introduced shuffling machines on it's blackjack tables. The card are returned to a slot in the machine at the end of every hand. What happens to them from there I've no idea, are they shuffled back into the deck?? Does anyone know how they work and how does this affect card counting???
I'm not a card counter but I have bought some books on the subject but there's no point learning if I can't use the skill!

[Shaggy]

I kills cardcounting. Unless of they let the cards build up in the discard tray for LOTS of hands before they reload them into the machine. Once the cards are reloaded, there is potential for those same cards to come out within a couple of hands. By playing a CSM (continuous shuffle machine) you are effectively playing a 5 deck game with 5% penetration.

-Shaggy

[Edenfield99]

Cheers Shaggy, I feared the worst and you've confirmed it

[playersare]

it's impossible to count cards against a CSM. the only silver lining (and a razor thin one at that) is that CSM's usually use only 4-5 decks vs. a standard 6-8 deck shoe. so for basic strategy players, it knocks a few hundreths of a percent off the house edge as compensation.

but I among many others certainly would just rather them disappear completely. I don't mind a machine that shuffles an entire shoe at a time to reduce downtime, but after every single hand is just...mean.

[CORed]

The only thing to do is play basic strategy for the minimum bet, and every time you lose a hand, whine about how the machines mess up the flow of the cards, or some such nonsense. If you can convince the fish that the machines are hurting them, so they don't play as much, maybe the casino will get rid of them.