D40+

says ok, I will go back and make sure you have access. Be...
says ok, I will go back and make sure you have access. Be...
Well-Known Member
Nov 2010
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5 out of 5 rating for D40+

Thanks to a tip from the member Chuck Jordan I was able to buy two boxes of the new DHS 3* D40+ balls from this place:

http://www.aliexpress.com/item/Excl...-Seamed-New-Material-Plastic/32793435592.html

I received them in about 10 days and I played with them this evening. I paid $15 for 12 balls. Here is my review:

I already believe that this is the best plastic ball in table tennis right now when everything is considered
.

From a playing perspective I actually like them slightly better than the Nittaku Premium!! I never thought I would say that about a Chinese plastic ball!

Surface of the ball looks exactly like Nittaku Premium. The seams are a little larger, though, more like earlier seamed balls from China.

They are absolutely perfectly round.

The static bounce is exactly the same height as Nittaku Premium. If you let the bounces die out on the table, they stop bouncing at exactly the same time the Nittaku does. This is a huge improvement for DHS. None of their earlier plastic balls bounced for crap.

The D40+ have a normal sound on bouncing (this is different from the 1* version).

Spin and speed is very similar to the Nittaku, but the DHS feels a little more solid. My practice partner could not tell the difference from the Nittaku Premium when I switched up on him. More significantly, coach Li Kewai (~2700 player) could tell a slight difference and his opinion is that he preferred the DHS D40+ to the Nittaku Premium, and I shared that opinion, although the difference is very very slight. I think the DHS might be very slightly heavier. There is no accounting for tastes, but I would be really surprised if very many people conclude that the D40+ is significantly worse to play with than Nittaku Premium.

On top of all that, the DHS40+ is cheaper. Also, as DHS stops the production of their previously horrible awful terrible miserable plastic balls, these will probably become the standard, and hopefully other companies will be putting their brands on this ball. It would be a major improvement for the sport. The key will be if DHS can make enough of these D40+ balls to meet the demand and still maintain this level of quality.

This is the best news I have been able to report in a really long time. As for my expertise on this, I think it is extensive. I know the plastic ball situation in detail (more than I know about most other equipment issues). Very early on I completely stopped playing with celluloid balls, and I have tried about every 40+ ball made, and I was the first one on English language TT forums to really push the idea that the seamless balls are decent, and not as bad as the prototypes floating around for awhile might have led us to believe. (At the time the expectation was that they would be really bad). Seamless balls actually have a lot of good properties, especially durability, but I think these new balls by DHS will probably be very bad news for the makers of seamless balls. I doubt once people get their hands on these, especially given the price, that people will want to use seamless very much. The playing properties are superior (by which I mean a lot closer to celluloid) and they are cheaper.

The likelihood as a result is that in the foreseeable future we will have a lot more uniformity of balls, which for the last few years has been a big problem for our sport. If in the future the dominant balls become the D40+ ones made by DHS (possibly sold by many companies) and the Nittaku Premium, we will have returned to a situation where the brand of ball doesn't matter very much (as in celluloid era).
 
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Well-Known Member
Mar 2015
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5 out of 5 rating for D40+

Hi,
today I played my first league match with this ball. I train and play with Joola Flash.
All balls were from a freshly opened box. I cleaned the balls (from the factory dust) and tested their roundness.
All were perfectly round. I spinned them on the table: absolutely no wobbling.
During warmup and gameplay, I felt that this is a hard and fast ball. I've read in other reviews that it has even less spin than the previous poly balls, but this isn't true. It's just average.
The best about this ball, the feeling you get on loops. If you hit hard you can really feel that the rubber grabs the ball. This was my main issue with poly balls: they are soft and it's much harder to get that feeling.
I played against a long pips blocker and I could confidently loop his balls.
I can see that those players who use nice spinny loops with fast brushing might not like the D40+. It's a faster ball but without more spin, so they might feel it less spinny.
This ball rewards direct gameplay.
Edge hits didn't broke the ball (in contrary to the Joola Flash I use), so durability shouldn't be a problem. And it's cheaper too.
 
5 out of 5 rating for D40+

I think Baal's review covered everything and yeah these balls play very close to Nittaku like you can easily switch between the two without noticing any difference. Everyone who I know who tried them said they were like the Nittakus and these are like half the price. The only difference I notice is that the D40 feels slightly lighter and has a slightly less glossy finish with less powder. In terms of durability, I've been using one ball for around 3 weeks and its still going. These balls also don't get as dirty as the Nittakus.
 
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New Member
Mar 2015
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Read 11 reviews
5 out of 5 rating for D40+

A lot of plastic balls easily break when hitting the edge. This ball doesn't. It is round and consistent. There is rarely a ball that is wobbly. It might be more expensive that other plastic balls, but the dhs ball lasts longer making it cheaper in the long run. One of the best balls so far
 
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New Member
Sep 2012
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3 out of 5 rating for D40+

I like the way the perfect ones play. I go through only 10 new DHS D40+ every six months. However, more and more of them have defects from the factory. If you hold the ball up to a bright light, you will see dark spots on the defective balls where part of the the plastic wall is thicker, about 1.5mm in size. If DHS would not sell it's factory seconds, and only sell good 1st quality I would rate these a 5 as the best plastic ball.
 
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4 out of 5 rating for D40+

Just to be clear: This review is for the D40+ balls (Ding Ning's picture on the box).

These are very good balls. In my mind, the Nittaku 3-star Premium 40+ is the standard of 40+ balls. This DHS ball is a good alternative, and the ball plays consistently and has good speed. I can tell the difference between these and the Nittaku ones right away, as the Nittaku balls sounds should higher pitched when bouncing/hitting. This gives the impression that the Nittaku ball is harder than these DHS balls.

I have played with it for a few weeks and like it more now than when first trying it. The first two balls out of the box didn't feel right, somehow. Now that I am used to how a non-damaged ball plays, this is a really good ball, and though a little different in feel from the Nittaku Premium 40+ it is still excellent. Very spinny, not overly bouncy, pretty consistent, though consistency could still be improved. I am changing this review back to 4-star, as I find that too many of the new balls have issues straight out of the box. Some sound broken. When the balls are first-quality, they play wonderfully; but, too many in the box should have been caught at the QA stage.
 
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Member
Jul 2019
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5 out of 5 rating for D40+

The balls DHS D40+ 3 stars are definitely one of the best balls today.
The biggest advantage is the natural reflection of the ball from the table.
Some balls such as Xushaofa or Jolla Prime
with the back spin stops and jumps vertically up.
If you do not have rapid acceleration, then pass the ball.
In this respect, DHS D40+ 3 star balls are much better, still have a natural reflection.
DHS D40 + have very good speed, roundness is not bad and durability is excellent.
 
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