Srixon is definitely a dark horse and generally underrated in terms of their premium golf ball offerings. As such, I was very excited for this test between the Z-Star and the Z-Star XV. Having never played a premium Srixon ball before, both of these balls were totally new to me. Let's see what they have to offer!
Most Noticeable Differences:
XV did seem to go a few yards longer on well-struck shots from the tee
XV was a hair firmer on drives and putts
Standard Z-Star did produce more spin into and around the greens
Other Notes:
As aforementioned, on well-struck shots, the Z-Star XV did seem to have a slight advantage in terms of distance, most notable on the driver with a good amount of roll-out. That being said, I was hitting the standard Z-Star extremely well so it was hard to see too much of an immediate difference between the distance of the two, and therefore I didn't feel like I was giving anything up by playing the Z-Star.
When it comes to the ball flight, I actually think the standard Z-Star had a higher flight. Once again, this could just be due to the fact that I was hitting better shots with the Z-Star, but it was consistent throughout the 9 holes I played it and even compared to the good shots hit with the XV.
On approach shots, the standard Z-Star definitely had more spin and consistently stopped on the pitch mark or even rolled back some. Perhaps the most noticeable difference between the two models was how they performed around the green in terms of chipping. The XV rolled out more on every shot compared to the Z-Star that produced more of a "bite" on the chips with it. Also the XV was a touch firmer on putts (which I actually preferred), however both of these were really soft balls.
As far as quality is concerned, both of these balls are top-notch. They have perhaps the best durability of any of the balls I have tested so far. After 9 holes with each, they both legitimately still looked brand new. This definitely surprised me because I have played a couple of Srixon Soft Feel balls where the outer coating on each one starts to flake off after just a few holes. But both of the Z-Star models were impressive and exceptional in this regard. Both are definitely a high-quality product to be compared with industry leaders like Titleist. Also bonus points for the color of these balls. They are a really bright white which helps finding them and distinguishing them from others on the course. The bright color also had the effect for me of making these balls appear slightly larger than others (I compared them to a Titleist ProV1x). And extra bonus points for being available in yellow as well!
Overall:
To be honest, I am totally impressed with both of these offerings from Srixon. If you're looking for a new ball that is tour quality and cheaper than the competition, you definitely need to have these on your list to try. As far as my personal testing of these go, I wasn't playing all that great when I tested these, so I might have to revisit this test, but I did get to know these balls and was able to get some good results of their performance for my game. I think if you're a soft ball person, you could play either of these. If you are coming off of the Chrome Soft (maybe as a result of the MGS testing) and looking for a really soft ball that still performs exceptionally (as in won't rob you of 10 yards on every shot), then the standard Z-Star is for you. The bottom line here, though, is that the XV goes a hair farther for me, but does sacrifice some performance around the green, so it comes down to what you're looking for or what you're game needs. For me, out of the two, I have to go with the standard Z-Star! I was hitting this ball lights out when I tested it and I loved the performance on my approach shots (I hit 3 more GIR with this model compared to the XV). It gave me the distance I wanted coupled with the control I needed.