6.5 mean 6.5mm diameter. so the satelite 6.5 is the slimmer one. I tried the 6.5 blast strung at 24 with zymax 67 with an yonex overgrip. The final balance was 295 and also felt head heavy. Very similar the the Satelite nitro as I wanted.
I don't know exactly, probably around 7.5 - 8 mm. The difference is mostly the flex. They say the thinner shaft is to move trough the air faster but I call ******** on that. Nontheless, the racquet is a steal at 109 USD for the quality of a top of the line Yonex.
X-Feel Blast shaft diameter is 7.5mm, I just measured it w/ a plastic vernier caliper. It is kinda stiff, comparable to Cab22 stiffness but the shaft is longer than the cab's. I don't own any newer Yonexes, only Cab20 Power, Cab20 Tour n Cab9 Tour SP for collection.
The X-Feel is stiffer than the Satelite 6.5 range. You can see this in the chart I provided earlier. I played with the X-Feel Blast and found my smash definitely improved - the same with the Satelite 6.5 Blast. I wasn't happy with the factory strings on the X-Feel and have restrung with NBG-98 which gives a much more improved feel. The X-Feel Blast though is quite stiff and I think would be more suitable for singles because I found that being head-heavy, it was a little harder to move around for quick doubles play. Although going to a lighter racquet afterwards - gave me better doubles speed. The Satelite 6.5 Blast though was more usable for doubles - at least for me, it gave me a better smash because my swing speed is not very fast. I will try out the Power racquets in the coming week.
Satelite 6.5 Power over x-feel Power How will you rate Satelite 6.5 Power over x-feel Power Planing to buy one of these two. I was playing with the nTense Essential and was very happy with it.
I played in a veterans team competition a couple of weeks ago. I used the X-Feel Blast in doubles and found it to be quite powerful. However, I did notice that after the first game, as I get a bit tired - my smash started to weaken. This is due to the shaft being very stiff (on the Babolat scale) and as you get tired, the swing speed drops off - only a little bit, but it was noticeably affecting my smash. When I changed racquets to a Satelite Synchro (older style racquet) I was able to get my smash back - so the main difference is, slower swing speed means more flexible shaft is better. I have also been playing with the X-Feel Power and the Satelite Power - over each of the X-Feel and Satelite Power and Blast racquets, I still come back to the X-Feel Power that suits my style of play better. I am about to restring my X-Feel Power and Satelite Power - so will compare those two properly with my usual string. As mentioned in other places in this forum, a racquet that suits one person does not necessarily suit another, so please find someone with the racquet and try it out.
Hey there John! Have you tried both the Power rackets as yet! It'd be wonderful if you could give a detailed comparison of both side by side. I'm planning of buying one and do not really have the luxury to buy both!! Is the thin shaft of the Satellite really faster than the X feel? Here in Germany the X feel Power is about 10 euros more than the Satellite power. Does it translate into better quality somehow? I'm actually veering towards the Satellite Power because of the flexible shaft. I tend to play more doubles here and I think that it'll be better for me. What do you say???
By the way, Nitro is very popular in Korea. Specs of Nitro: 300mm head heavy, medium flexible, kevlar t-joint, Zylon mesh. Did the babolat use different composite on nitro than on X-Feel or Satelite series? Which one is the newer one? Nitro? X-Feel? Satelite?
I have Sat Power and Sat Blast. Both really awesome rackets. The blast pruduces some more power but the power is a bitt more easy to manouver.
can anyone tell the flexibility? I know the babolat rated it as medium. Another dealer says it is med-stiff. Can you tell about the flexibility from you experience? If you can compare with Yonex Arc Saber 7, is the blast more or less flexible?
Man, these look enticing too. Too many rackets to try and buy, not nearly enough money for even some of them, let alone all! Posting and being active on BC is even more dangerous to one's wallet than just reading it, and I thought that was bad already..
Satellite is newest (released last year I think). X-Feel is at least 3 yrs old. Not sure about Nitro.
Satelite Nitro is an "old" model, Kevlar Tech dates 4 or 5 years ago. But Nitro 2nd generation, quite the same than the old one is 2 years old just newer than X Feels)
I am a current user of the X-Feel Power for about a year and this racquet is a good choice within its price range (Just about a half of price when compared to Yonex top models in Hong Kong). I really love the handling of this racquet and its feeling is quite similar to NS9900 of Yonex. As most of the users pointed out, the smashing power of the racquet is not that great,so i am now quite interested in getting a Satellite 6.5 Blast to see whether the smashing would be better. Also thanks for John writing a detailed user review so that i can understand the difference between X-feel and the new Satellite 6.5. (Also surprised to see the new color pattern of X-feel series! But i prefer the old one )
Babolat sattelite 6.5 power Hi all, Just a short review of this racket. I had several rackets and playing a while with the VT80 and the Arcsaber 10 I had the feeling that again my love heat relationship with Yonex popped up again. So I went again searching for a racket which could fulfill my needs in a racket. I ended up to test with testing the Sattelite 6.5 power. The rackets was strung with BG80 at I believe 10kg. I was looking for a racket which has a little bit more weight in the top and a little bit more flex in the shaft. A long time ago I played with the sattelite synchro and was very satisfied with this series. Visual, nice color combined with chrome and white. Feel a bit head heavier than the VT80. I played with the racket for 2 hours in several games. Hitting and smash was good and because of the small grip G2 (according to Yonex G4) good controlable. Had to get used to the weight in the top again. But after a while it was feeling like coming home. After that test I decided to sell my Yonex and buy Babolat instead of that money. I bought 3 of them and strung them with the NBG98 at 10,5 kg. Overall a good and cheaper racket than Yonex. Good doubles racket manouvrability is really well and feeling is excellent. As I'm a hard hitter as well I found this racket good for my style of play because of the shaft is somewhat more flexible than a stiff yonex racket. Because of the lenght of 675mm it isn't shorter than a VT80 where I don't need to adapt to the lenght of the racket. This is my opinion and because there was no review on this I put my review here. Hope that this info can contribute on this subject.
