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I only had a couple of sessions with it at this moment and my first impressions are : It has higher arc then tenergy 05, It grips the ball a bit better so its easier to attack half long balls for example or lift underspin. The overall feeling is similar to boosted tenergy 05 ( I enjoyed it more then 05) and it feels a notch softer than tenergy 05 but very similar hardness overall. It provides a loud noise and it is abit lighter then tenergy 05 (67 uncut comparing to 70). Although it has alot of control I wouldnt recommend it for a backhand rubber unless you are a pro because it has high arc and long catapult effect. It is rumoured to have a very good durability so maybe the price comparing to tenergy 05 is barely acceptable but still very overpriced. I can say at the moment for my game and the feeling it provides its a nice upgrade and I am using a blade with low through so it paired nicely.

ciao TIM, con quale spessore delle gomma tu hai provato?

The T25 is a rubber not made for the average player. It is a rubber for those who play a quick off the bounce and rely on spin placement. The spin on T25 is equal to the amount of T05 depending, when you contact the ball. It is a hard rubber to play if you do not have quick reaction or good consistency on spin. Just know it is a specialist rubber. Not made for everyone. It's like Koki Niwa play style rubber.

I bought this blade because I was looking for something that was easier to master than for example a viscaria, timo boll alc of TBS blade.
I first tried an Innerforce ALC but didn't like it because I felt like the loss in speed was too big for me.
So then I tried the Freitas and it was a very good compromise.
Since this is still a pretty fast blade, I paired it with the forgiving Rozena, and indeed I felt like I had that extra bit of control, without giving up too much power.
From an offensive point of view, everything works very well from all distances.
It packs a punch, but you don't accidently go over the edge, as with a harder/faster blade.

I also like it if a blade isn't too hard, so the limba outer ply is a good fit there as well.
I would have hoped that the softer touch would also help me during short play, but that's where I am truly disappointed.
For some reason, the gained control doesn't shine through when playing over the table, or doing service returns or blocking heavy rotation close to the table.
Recently, I got curious and paired the blade with a Hexer Grip, which also isn't the most aggressive rubber out there, and the result was even worse :-(

I know things like block and service return are my weakness, and that it is even worse when playing with a TBS or something.
I'm just trying to say, after 6 months of trying, I still couldn't fix these issues and I must admit that the blade is still too lively for me, even though it has a softer touch than a Boll ALC or something.
So, although a bit more forgiving, this blade is still up there in the same league as TBS, Boll ALC, Viscaria, ...

My conclusion:
For me, this is the best overall Butterfly blade I've tried so far (amongst TBS, Boll ALC, Liu Shiwen, Innerforce ALC, Innerforce ZLC).
If a Boll ALC is too hard to master, but you think an Innerforce is not lively enough, this may be what you're looking for.
But remember this is still a pretty fast blade and subtle strokes will cost a lot of training, especially if you pair it with faster rubbers.

Because of this, I will be selling my Freitas ALC.
Please have a look in the 2nd hand section of the forum...

One of the best blades i have ever used in the speed glue era...it has a normal small sweet spot as a thinner 5ply wood blade. It has great potential to produce spin and it is a high throw blade with decent feel and good blocking. With today's equipment i would recommend it for a beginner up to 1400 US rating level; I recommend it for a player with an allround style of play that has a vision for a game that is spin and feel oriented and likes to feel vibration in their hand. it plays well in close to mid distance from the table.

Incredible spin. Made with new thicker-sponge, thinner rubber-concept. Tried on Nittaku Septear Lead and Stiga Clipper CR. On CR it is a monster, very, very fast. But the spin is ridicolos. I have won alot of my points in the league just on my serves with incredible spin. Played 110 times with it, then bought a Hexer Powergrip to try. Also good, Good on both FH and BH, but this kind of rubber is always FH for me. Always in black. Highly recommended speedglued too. The sound in the traininghall on the Septear is awesome. Buy and try!

Had the pleasure of testing out the Xiom Ice Cream AZX over the last few weeks! After extraction from the trapezoidal prism box, here are the basic stats:

Thickness - 5.7mm
Weight - 87g
Headsize - 157x150
Structure - Koto-ALC-Limba-Kiri-Limba-ZLC-Koto



Visuals

The build quality is super-high - nice finishing on the fiber layer, no blemishes anywhere I can see. The handle is wide, but fairly flat - it feels very comfortable to me, but it isn't as beefy as some bigly yuge euro handles. I'm happy to say that the wings are different to recent Xiom blades (e.g. Vega Pro) and the overall feel in the hand is excellent. Everyone's grip is different of course, so this is a very personal thing, but I'm glad Xiom have made this change.

Testing

I've put 9 sessions in with the AZX before finishing this review, 3 sessions each with 3 different setups. Initially I went with my current rubbers (QiJi, Moon Speed Special) to give a direct comparison to what I've been using recently. Then I switched to Rasanter R47 Ultramax on both sides in an effort to bring out the hybrid nature of the blade with a rubber I'm familiar with, and finally to Omega VII Pro on both sides.

Basic Speed and Drives

From initial reviews, I was concerned about the speed and if it would be too much to handle. Well, it's fast, but not insane. I'd put it slightly above a Viscaria, but noticeably below a MJ-ZLC.

The feel on basic drives is pretty sharp, but I've used harder Boll ALCs so it's not excessive. The ALC side feels a bit more "distant" than the ZLC - not hollow, but more of a "dry" feel for want of a better word. I didn't really notice a big difference in speed between the two wings here.

It's also pretty linear and easy to use, if you accept that the speed is generally high all the time.

Looping

When using more expansive strokes, you notice the big potential for power from the blade. Although there isn't excessive flex, it's simply fast. I found slow loops to be a little awkward because the blade just wants to go faster, deeper, more more and so on. It's very good from distance - you can play some massive strokes from 2m back, and the pace and spin result in some incredible bombs.

Looping is the time when the difference between the ALC and ZLC becomes really noticeable. The ALC side produces a meaningfully high arc in comparison with the ZLC. I was skeptical about this, but I have to admit that it appears to be a real feature of the blade. When looping hard, I can really load up the spin on the ALC side, but the ZLC goes much flatter and gives the impression of being faster (simply because it's a more direct path to the table).

Blocking, Flicks, Short Game

I found the blade to be medium stiff overall, which helps a lot when blocking. Add this to the sharpness of the initial feel and it works very well when blocking, if you can cope with the pace.

BH flicks are good - fast enough (obviously), direct, and the ZLC's lower-arc nature helps to keep the ball low when putting some zip on a short service return.

Short game was hard for me. It's a bouncy blade, and with hard eurojap rubber it's a handful for my level. I popped a lot of pushes and service returns up, especially with the R47. I'm used to more forgiving blades and would need to make adjustments.

Overall

This is a well-made blade, with a premium feel. It's fast and capable of very destructive play, without being uncontrollably quick. I feel that it suits a highly-mobile, dynamic player who attacks from mid distance and has great footwork and mobility. This doesn't describe me of course - but I can picture it being a real weapon for lots of younger/faster/better players.

The "hybrid" construction is interesting, and while I was initially skeptical it does have a noticeable effect on play. And it's also a bit different to other combination blades I've used in the past, and worthy of a bit of time to describe here I think. Previously, I've used Sanwei Two-Face, Valiant Terminator, and custom builds by Levi, tt-manufaktur and Ross Leidy but all of these used different outer plies to create the combination effect (the Valiant stands alone here in having ALC/ZLC as well as an outer ply difference). This approach does the trick, but introduces a marked difference in feel/speed between the two wings. This may be what you're looking for of course, but adapting to this imbalance takes time - the contrast between the FH and BH isn't intuitive by definition. The AZX is different here, because the basic properties of the blade feel very similar - feel, speed and so on. You just get a higher arc with the ALC side. It seems to have a singular aim - support the common need of the standard, modern two-winged loop player by having a dynamic, high arc on the FH side and a more direct, lower arc on BH - while introducing a minimum of disruption to the overall balance of the blade. I presume this is what Xiom are hinting at with their notes on blade balance and being the first hybrid of this type. If so, I think it's a success! I haven't used anything quite like it before, and it's a fascinating approach.

First of all I would like to thanks TTD member hils4ever and XIOM for giving me the opportunity to test the new XIOM Jung Youngsik Ice Cream AZX blade.

Unboxing
The Ice Cream AZX comes in a beautiful purple, orange and silver presentation box which has a trapezoid shape to simulate an ice cream. On top of the box the symbol of Jung Youngsik is shaped like and arrow. It looks good and the details are held simple and clean. My first impressions when grabbing the blade I could feel the finish was smooth and the quality is in the high end of the scale. I wish though that the edges of the wings were sanded down a bit instead of having a sharp edge. The design of Ice Cream blade is very appealing as well. The color scheme from the presentation box is to find on the handle of the blade where the black color is used as background, the purple color on the Zephylium Carbon side (ZLC) and orange color on the Arylate Carbon side. On the blade faces there is some marketing text and JYS signature is on the ALC side of the blade. Near the wings the Xiom has printed an A and a Z to distinguish the sides of the blade. The logos on the handle looks great and are made metal. It is getting more common that the companies are letting go of the plastic lens which has been used for decades. In the bottom of the handle the a logo saying Ice Cream, XIOM and JTTAA. It has a bit of 3D effect when looking at it from an angle. I don’t know if it’s for checking genuity of the blade, but if not, it is a nice detail.











The sample I got is FL and has these specs:
Composition: Koto-ALC-Limba-Kiri-Limba-ZLC-Koto
Weight: 85g
Thickness: 5.7mm
Handle size: 100x23x33mm Width at narrow flared section is 25mm
Head size: 157x150mm















I wanted to do a frequency test, but forgot to do it before gluing the rubbers on. I will add it later.

Comparing the handle with a Viscaria the Ice Cream seems to be a bit smaller than Vis, but not as small as some newer DHS blades.

Test setup will be 2 times Xiom Omega 7 Pro max on each side ending up a total weight at 183g which isn’t that bad considering having two max rubbers glued on blade. Review is based on 5 training sessions of approx. 2 hours each.



Drive
When hitting the ball I could immediate feel the blade and the combination with Omega 7 Pro was fast. The balance of the blade is towards the center which I like more than head heavy setups. Hitting with the A side the vibration is similar to other ALC blades which is a bit numb, but still you have the slight feeling of the ball. I try to twiddle the racket and play with the Z side. Here there was a noticeable difference! Playing with the Z side the vibrations was a lot and it felt more soft than when playing with the A side. The sweet spot of the blade is large making it very consistent to play with.

Loop
When looping with the A side the impression of power and using the high gear of the O7P the full potential of the Ice Cream blade was pretty obvious. I had to adjust a bit coming from with a chinese rubber with flatterer trajectory, but when the adjustments were made it was easy to land the balls on the table. The A side has a medium-high arc and medium throw and the dwell was very good even with a 47.5deg rubber. The O7P is making a nice click sound like the good speed glue era. My impression of the Z side when looping was that is was a bit slower and the dwell was greater than playing the A side. The throw of the Z side is low-medium and the arc of the ball was medium. Engaging the ZLC layer I could the extra dwell compared to the ALC, but this is without compromising the balance of the blade.

Block
The passive game with the Ice Cream blade together with O7M it excels good control and consistency from the large sweet spot. In terms of sides I prefer blocking with the Z side in BH and A side in FH. Still when punching a bit or being active on the incoming balls you still have the feeling of having good control.

Short/Flick
In the short game you need to have a good touch to be able to keep the 2nd ball short due to bouncy rubbers and the outer koto. The O7P are not so sensitive to incoming spin as e.g. T05 which is good if you struggle with spin when receiving the ball. Flicking with Z side in BH is preferable for me, The dwell from the blade using the low gear of the O7P making the easy to flick. You still need to be active on the ball. Flicking with the A side in FH you only need to use a short stroke because the catapult effect from the rubber and the hard koto. Again here if you have a good technique it is easy to flick with less effort.

Conclusion
The Xiom Jung Youngsik Ice Cream AZX is a high end signature blade which comes at a price of 159.90 EUR which is pretty similar to other composite blades from Butterfly. The blade is really nice and the durability is good. I like the overall design of the whole package, but for my personal preference the blade is a bit too fast. I would rate it on par with the Viscaria in terms of speed and maybe a little faster. The blade is definitely for experienced players that like to play from close to mid distance from the table. It is a looping blade which is great in the blocking game. Flicks using the ZLC side is noticeably one of the strong attributes of the blade. If you are the type of player that builds you game with some of the aspects above I would recommend this blade to this person.

I switched to this rubber in December and use on both sides of my Tibhar Stratus Power wood blade.
Right off the bat, the spin from this rubber is too good, not a single complain there. Whether it be 3rd ball openings or top-spin rallies the spin is incredible.
It is also very easy to vary the spin using the rubber. So, dummies are really easy to execute - it also does well at fooling the opponent.
Speed is also very good - but I am using it on a wooden construction so I can't really get as much speed as the rubber offers.
In the department of control, you will need to be an experienced player with well developed and confident strokes to adequately utilize this rubber. That being said, if your arm is set it is pretty easy to control the ball and push it to the corners of the table even in high-speed rallies.

I have noticed that touch play is not very good - serves will often drift long and high, so will short touches if not playing with utmost concentration. But once the rally opens up you can really dominate the opponent.
Overall, the best rubber I have used.

As mentioned by yogi_bear. This rubber is not for learning table tennis. This rubber is for people that already have a decent technique and spent time with systematic practice to improve it.

The nominal 55 degree sponge is not as noticable as with other compareble rubbers (like Joola Golden Tango). The rubber and topsheet are very bouncy and there is no time a "dead" feeling that you experience so often with harder rubbers. Compared to a Omega 7 Pro, it does not really feel any harder, just much faster. In the begining I used the O7P and O7T on a Vega Tour blade and as mentioned in the O7P review I struggled with the speed of both rubbers.
Over summer last year I was able to adapt to the O7P very well and played it now for 5 month on my FH.
After I received the Omega 7 Tour I tried on the FH first and again had the same problem with speed and spin sensivity as earlier with the O7P. The Omega 7 tour faster and shots tend to get even longer than with the Pro. Blocking was nearly impossible in the beginning and after like 5 hours of trying I gave up.
I then tried the Omega 7 Tour on the backhand and this worked better. Maybe because of the shoter strokes, I was able to manage the speed and also got used to blocking. Only my underspin shots and chops were many times to long and so I gave up on the O7T and wanted to save it for later in the year, when our match season is over, to give it more time in practice like the O7P.

But....I did also receive the new XIOM IceCream Blade and I was surprised how the behaviour of this rubber changed after using it on the this blade. I use the O7T now on the ALC side and use if as my FH rubber. Gone is the blocking problem. I can now precisly block and placement is excellent. Short play is a brease and shots that previously went too long, now have a better arc and get on the table again.

I did put weigth on the negative side, although it has to be mentioned. Omega 7 Tour is a heavy rubber, but this is to be expected with 55 degree rubber.

All in all this rubber is a spin machine. With every stroke you will be able to generate spin. If you are used to the O7P already and would like to add a speed and spin, than O7T is worth a try. It will require some time to get used to the amount of speed. But you will be rewarded with excellent loops with high spin and excellent speed.

As mentioned, the rubber is sensitive to the blade composition. I found it difficult to play it with ZLC (I tried it with the Vega Tour and IceCream ZLC side as well) but works perfectly with the IceCream AZX ALC side (maybe it was designed that way)....

Weight: 91g

I was sceptical in the beginning as I have played a XIOM Vega Tour blade for quite some time and none of the newer XIOM blade were good enought to replace it. The special Hinoki feel combined with special core and ZLC was the perfect combination for me.

From the specs the IceCream AZX is nothing even comparable to Vega Tour with Koto outerply and ALC composite. Nevertheless XIOM was generous to have me play this blade and so I gave it a try. Glad I did, because IceCream blade is really outstanding.

ALC side has very crisp and noticable feedback, which helped me to improve my FH loops, as I can very well notice if I hit the ball more towards the center or outer of the blade. The loop arc is more noticable compared to my Vega Tour, even with rubbers that have a lower throw like the new Omega 7 rubbers. But most noticable is the very high precision that I can now put into my shots. Placement is much easier with this blade.
Ball contact is very short, but still looping backspin is working well.

ZLC side has less feedback (compareble with Vega Tour), but still enough to be noticable. The throw is a bit flater than with ALC, which requires a bit different technique when looping against backspin.

I did play ALC on FH (with various rubbers like Vega Pro, Omega 7 Pro and Omega 7 Tour). I can only anticipate that IceCream was designed for O7x rubbers (or the otherway round) but the O7x rubbers work extremly well with the blade. I first had the O7P on the blade and it already worked perfectly, but lately changed to O7T and this now the combination I stick with.

On BH (ZLC) the O7T was bit to much speed and I had less control in blocking, but with O7P it works as before.

I didn't mention spin so far, but the blade supports very well in generating spin. I didn't miss anything compared to my already spinny Vega Tour blade. I really like the higher precision of the IceCream, which makes even risky placement (loops to wide FH or parallel blocks towards the edge of the table) much easier.

The IceCream Blade definitly is a blade for people that do regular systematic practicing. It will be hard to manage this blade and the O7x rubbers with only 1-2 hours fun table tennis a week. The blade has a higher speed than Vega Tour, but as the the Vega Tour it is very linear in playing.
No bouncy effect that kicks in when you don't need it. If you hit the ball hard, the shot is blazzing fast, if you only touch the ball, it is short and slow. I really like this behaviour.

A small comment on the handle. XIOM really did change the handle for the better. The handle now fits perfectly in my hand and the cross over to the blade itself is not as edgy as with the Feel Series.

Professional equipement developed by XIOM... I really like it. I found a very worthy replacement for my Vega Tour (which I will keep because of it special material combination)

Heavily overshadowed by other Hexers thanks to Andro themselves. Andro tried promoting this rubber by means of durability which is the biggest mistake ever, and official ratings were also complete BS. In fact depending on the players/blades this is still the best Hexer contender alongside even the latest Hexer Grip/Powergrip. It's also one of the top 3 Chinese-Euro Hybrid rubbers in my mind alongside Joola Golden Tango PS and Tibhar Hybrid K2 (the latter one might be rare but I can guarantee it's good), although Duro does give quite a different softish hitting feel from the other 2.

Spin: The mild tackiness of this rubber isn't only for durability as Andro suggested, but also helps Chinese-style brushing strokes / spinning, and believe it or not this still has the best surface grip among the Hexer series. Even Grip/Powergrip you would have to sink into the topsheet/sponge a little bit to get the grip while Duro doesn't require such. Although still a bit offf from spinniest Chinese rubbers like Hurricane 3, Battle 2 etc, the overall spin level is still higher than even my Omega 7 Pro for my current backhand which is already real spinny. Short games spin potential is unquestionable (better than Grip/Powergrip), and it's even a bit spinnier under harder impacts as the ball sinks even just a bit deeper into the 42.5 sponge. The mild-tacky topsheet/soft sponge combo surprisingly works here despite this is usually the recipe that fails Chinese topsheets.

Speed: Low catapult but by no means slow. Still faster than Hexer Powersponge at least. A bit bouncy at lower gears if comparing to Chinese standards I would say it's closer to medium/medium-slow Euro rubbers' standards. You wouldn't want the sponge too fast anyway with the topsheet which favors Chinese-style strokes when it comes to spinning. It's worth noting however that the sponge doesn't easily bottom out, which has always been the strength of Andro (even for their 37.5deg sponge), so there's more speed than you expected once you drilled through the 42.5deg sponge a lot under very hard impacts. Behaves a bit like Chinese rubbers in that regard if you ignore the extra amount of sponge compression in Duro's case.

Power(Spin+speed):
If considering purely from rubber perspectives then ultimate power would be lacking when compared to Chinese Provincial rubbers such as Battle 2, Sanwei's Target National and a boosted H3 due to the medium-soft sponge, so ultimate spin/speed are a bit below the likes of above, however Duro offers better power at softer strokes. Hard strokes it's more comparable to Hexer Grip while Grip would ultimately edge out with its noticeably faster sponge. For reference Grip is even easier to generate power at medium impacts.
However Duro is more geared towards hard spinning than speed, so having a fast stiff blade can make up some of the power disadvantages.

Arc / Throw:
By general standards it's closer to the range of Medium to medium high depending on the blade chosen. However deadly low-arc topspins can be executed at will.

Control: Always been best aspects about Hexers, even till now there're hardly any rubbers that can match Hexers' forgiveness when comes to (counter) topspin games. Some Chinese rubbers maybe even better at short games due to much lower bounciness but Duro is still very good at that, even flicks are easy as hell despite 42.5 sponge, and overall controllability wise Duro is easily one of very best in the market right now.

Weight: At not even 43g after cutting Duro is very light for a rubber which resembles Chinese rubbers' behaviors. Even Grip/Powergrip weighs close to the 50g mark and only unboosted non-Neo H3s can come just a bit closer to Duro's weight. Most other Chinese rubbers (even without boosting) easily go beyond the 50g mark or above. If you don't have beastly arm strengths of the pros then the weight savings from Duro might make quite a profound difference in actual match play.

Hexer Duro may not have the best power of top Chinese rubbers but there're other strengths (such as control and easily extractable power, comparing to Chinese rubbers at least) which makes it an (almost) top-performing Chinese-Euro Hybrid rubber which performs like nothing else on the market, even when comparing to Tango PS or Hybrid K2. I personally don't pay much attention to durability but I'm on my 3rd sheet of Duro and I can say its durability is more than good enough, if not best.
Suggest pairing Duro with blades that have still top ply to facilitate sponge engagement for spin/power. Duro is also a great backhand choice for those who have good looping techniques on backhand and meanwhile want do things with great safety and not too fast. If u're used to other European rubbers for backhand u shouldn't have difficulties with transitioning to Duro thanks to its hugely forgiving nature as well as retaining Euro-type feedback when impacting the ball.

Rubbers used: MX-P, Sanwei Target National, T05, Bluestorm Z2
The first thing I noted when I started playing with this blade is that it does not perform very well in close to the table counter or drive rallies from the bh side. This blade's forte is backing up a little and playing topspins with as much quality as you can. It's also surprising to me that despite the crisp and relatively hard feeling you get, the ability to grab and spin the ball is very strong. Opening up is pretty much effortless and the spin you can generate is very high. Still I would not recommend trying to play hard and agressive with the blade as the ball tends to overshoot when you try doing so and that's not what Butterfly designed the blade to do. You have to go for spin and placement over speed. The gears that this blade has are one of its biggest strengths. Even with MX-P on the bh I was able to push quite short to the table or go for a soft spinny flick off a low push and then follow up with a much stronger shot. Another thing I noticed is that the older ALCs (without the hologram) tend to be a bit faster than the newer ones with the hologram (Similar case with Viscaria). The blade pairs very well with Tenergy and MX-P but the Bluestorm felt a bit too slow. The Target was very good on the forehand but I would not recommend using a very hard or tacky Chinese rubber like Hurricane 2. All in all, if you know how to use it, this blade is one that is very hard to go wrong with.

The SPW is a great racket and has a cool design on the handle but turns brown pretty quick if you sweat at all. The speed is great and when I hit with it correctly the ball hits the table. I use right now rising dragon 2.0 on both sides and it works great for the bh but not so much for the FH. (All suggestions welcomed). The only negative I have is the wings at the handle. They are pretty deep and it can get to rubbing your middle finger if you hold the grip to tight. I sanded mine bc it was rubbing a blister. The head is a little heavy at first but you get use to it fairly quick.

Blade = 89g
Rising Dragon FH & BH - do not recommend for FH
total weight 201g

This was my second blade after the YEO 7 Power with the same rubbers. I use reverse penhold backhand (RPB) and my playing level is currently around 1700 US rating. This is a very underrated blade. Similar to the Yasaka Sweden Extra, but with a noticeably bigger sweet spot (due to the harder outer surface).
In comparison to the YEO 7 Power:
-More dwell time. I could immediately feel that it was easier to lift underspin balls with this blade, especially on the backhand. My coach even commented that my loops were more spinny after I switched to this blade.
-More control: Blocking is much easier due to the slower speed. Looping half-long underspin balls out of position is also much easier to keep on the table, since the blade is slower and has more dwell. I probably earned 30% more points as before because I had a lot fewer unforced errors due to this blade.
-Not lacking in power. From mid and far distance, this blade does not lack power as long as your technique is good (using hips and forearm snap). Having faster rubbers that have higher throw angle will also help (I use boosted hurricane 3). I can backhand loop (RPB) far from the table as well if I add wrist and a little body.
-Sweet spot is around the size of a baseball. It’s slightly less than YEO 7 Power, but let's be honest: YEO 7 Power has a HUGE sweet spot that can rival that of the Butterfly ZJK super ZLC. So the sweet spot on this is a good size for an all wood blade, but you can definitely tell when your contact is clean or not – helped me realize when I should slow down a bit on the loop to control the contact point.
-Feeling is very noticeable – When you hit the sweet spot, it’s about the same amount of vibration as the YEO 7 Power. But the feeling itself isn’t really crisp in quality like the YEO 7 Power. It’s more like a low-frequency tuning fork (that doesn’t vibrate as long).
Notes:
-You might have to add a coat of lacquer to the edge of the blade since the soft center layer of wood might stick to your edge tape and peel off in little bits. Also, if you accidentally hit the table when “pushing” no-spin short serves, the edges of the red outer layer might break off just a little bit (a millimeter or two). But it’s very minor and I haven’t had issues with delamination in the couple months I’ve had this blade. (And for this price, replacing it 9 times in a row would still be less expensive than a high-end butterfly blade)
-The value is PHENOMENAL. I got it on sale for $29 from TT11. This is an unbeatable price. Will buy again for sure.

Essentially, this blade (made by DHS for Donic) is the Hurricane Long V but without that slender handle. And at a much better price point. Great for those who like Long V style blades.

This rubber was likely the best of the generation of ESN tenors that came out almost a decade ago (Baracuda, Hexer, Genius, Xplode, Energy Xtra, Vega Pro) and one of the very last to be released. Nittaku rubbers tend to be sold at a price premium in most parts of the world so this rubber has been far less popular than it should have been. This had changed in recent times at it is now available at discounted volume deals at many European retailers. This and the improved performance of ESN rubbers in general with the plastic ball is encouraging people to revisit the generation.

Fastarc G1 is like Tenergy 05 with less catapult - it is better than Baracuda in this regard as Baracuda was painfully slow and harder to block with. Fastarc fixes some of those issues.

It works well on all kinds of blades and rubbers and I use it on hard piles like wenge/Lati and Koto. It generates good spin and will reward many players. This is now my favorite rubber and will spend a long time on my paddle. I feel confident enough in the grio and the spin that I suspect it will be a long while before I use something else. It is like Omega V Asia but easier to play with and faster, which would have helped me had I known about this a year or two ago. It also has some of the spin qualities of rubbers like Hexer and Genius. It doesn't have the catapult of Vega Pro that I didn't like.

If you like any of those rubbers, give this rubber a try. You may or may not prefer it, but its quality is worth testing it as you may be pleasantly surprised. The fact that it is now cheaper in Europe is a plus as well.

To me this is top spot rubber! I decided to use it for my forehand and it was best decision!
I use the 2.1 mm sponge and my attacks are precize and fast!
Serves are full of spin, even pimple out players have huge trouble bringing my serves back. When I use my chop serve, most of the players put it into the net first few times. The touch play is also excellent, the ball makes what I want it to do.
I had problems when I tryed the maxx version, that was not good - but I am too much used for the 2.1, max is just too fast for me.
The rubber stayed in its qualities for 4 months (which is half of season here) and then I decided to change to a new one.
I am very happy with this one!

Xiom AXZi Ice Cream Blade
Weight: 91 grams
Thickness: 5.7mm
Plies: 7 (limba – limba – ALC – Kiri – ZLC – Limba – Limba)
Speed: OFF+
Stiffness: Medium Stiff


The Ice Cream Blade that I was really waiting for has arrived!! Good thing Xiom sent me the blade as soon as they have it stock. This is the one that I really liked because of the inner composite construction of the blade. I am also a limba kind of player because I love using DHS Hurricane 3 in my forehand. The AZX is a good blade but it was too fast for my style of play and it is more of an advanced or high level player. The AZXi, although even if it is a fast blade, it is suited for players who have developed some skills but not necessarily competitive type of player levels. The quality is as good as the AZX but when compared to older blades, the Ice cream blade series seem to be a notch higher in terms of quality, construction and finish. I would like to commend Xiom once again for taking into consideration in which I suggested to them that they need to change the shape of the neck and handle of the new blades as what other people who have also told me about the handles of the Feel Series. I used the Xiom Omega VII Pro as my backhand rubber and the Hurricane 3 as my fh rubber. I also switched the rubbers for the 2 sides just to test them also. I placed the Hurricane 3 first in the ALC side since I am the type of person who likes the ALC because it is not too fast nor too hard compared to pure carbon layers or ZLC layers. I also boosted the Hurricane 3.

I tested the ball on the bare blade and bounced it a few times to try and check the sound of the blade. I immediately saw that it has a lower bounce compared to the AZX. It also has a lower pitch compared to the AZX. Immediately you can tell the gap of speed even with the ZL layer. When I first used the bat for table drills for about 30 minutes, I immediately love the ALC layer using the Hurricane 3 because this is the feel I am always looking for in a blade. The ball feedback to hand is just right and no bad vibrations whatsoever. The speed is very good and above expected speed level. I thought this was slow at first but it is speedy enough. I would compare the speed as in the level of Viscaria or the Stardivarius if not faster. This is on the ALC side. The ZL side is more or less on the sped of the Innerforce ZLC.

The thing that sets it apart from the Innerforce ZLC/ALC is that for me the AZXi has a better feel. I could feel that it has more flex despite having 1 ZLC layer. This is one of the feel good blades in market right now. It feels right on everything and it’s like it is so nice to hit with. I find it easier to loop at first and it did not take a lot of effort to adjust especially the ALC side. The AZX has control but not as much as the AZXi. On the ALC side the arc with the Hurricane 3 was medium. It was not as high ast he AZX that I have observed. Even using the Omega VII Pro, the arc of the ball when I was spinning it it was medium to medium low but with a longer trajectory. The trajectory of the AZXi was not as long compared to the AZX and I think this was the main factor why the amount of control that I have for the AZXi is much better compared to the AZX. The AZXi loops really that good especially the arylate carbon part because it is very forgiving on your strong shots. The ZL fiber side has also good control but it is more direct and hard hitting. Several players in the club like both ZLC and ALC side of the blade. I prefer the ALC side myself but a lot of them love both sides especially when they used the Omega VII Pro as a forehand rubber. There was a high level player who tried the Hurricane 3 on the alc side and he really like it that he was hitting counters with the blade the minute he was using it in drills. At least with the AZXi, the Omega VII was also very forgiving and when you are loop driving very low balls, you could still have rooms for mistakes and the ball still hit the target. On the backhand, it is already given that the ALC is very controllable, the ZLC on the other hand need some fine tuning for players like me because it feels harder and offer more rebound power even just on blocks. Some people would prefer the ZL on their forehand for more power and just use the ALC for their backhand for more control. People like me prefer the ALC because we wanted to have more control and Hurricane 3 is much better with ALC in my opinion.

All in all a very good and balanced blade which personally for me rates high in control and speed but at the same have a very good feel. Had this been an ALC blade on both sides, I think I would be the happiest guy in the world right now. For other people they cannot just say anything bad against the blade because they really like it. I think people also are saying that the prices of both blades are kinda high but these two blades are still lower than several ridiculously high-priced blades. I am sure these 2 blades can outperform those blades.