Hey guys. About 7 years ago I had a XD in 357 Sig, really liked it but decided to sell when I enlisted. A couple years later I shot a buddies XD sub compact 9 and ate the X ring out of the target, the pistol and I got along nicely. Now today I own a XDm 45 and then a bunch of Glocks but I am interested in finding the handgun that I do the best with in 9mm. I recently did a sort of face off between my Glock 19, a VP9, a PPQ and a FNS-9 in which the FNS-9 was the best one I fired. But all that reminded me of that old XD subcompact that I felt I had so much harmony with years ago. So right now I am looking to pick up a FNS-9C (It will be a while) but I am also considering a XD 9 or XD 9 Subcompact. The issue I'm running into is that I know the XD gets bashed for having "inferior" materials by comparison to the Blocks and the M&Ps (something about forged vs cast). I would like someone in the know to school me here, maybe toss in some links to some data? I'm not trying to say XDs are bad guns, I still rock my XDm, I'm just trying to satisfy my inner OCD.

Thanks guys

I have an XD-40 in Sub-Compact, Service and Tactical.  The XD-40 Tactical is approaching 40K rounds through it.  Nearly all of that fired in USPSA competition.  In that nearly 40k rds fired I have had only two factory parts break.  At about 4K the locking block cracked.  The early XD-40s, of which mine was one, where know for cracking the locking blocks.  Even after noticing the crack I proceeded to shoot several more matches (including a sectional match) with it and it never failed to function.  SA fixed it in 7days. At about 6K the trigger return spring broke, SA sent me a new one no questions asked.  Since then the gun has been a champ.  I have had one or two after market parts fail at later points but I can't put that on SA.  I did a pretty extensive trigger job on it.  My XD-40 Service has about 8K on it with not problems and the XD-40 Sub Compact, my carry gun, has about 5K, again no issues.  I have been pretty happy with mine.


Picture taken around 30k

Aside from some reports of the striker retaining roll pin breaking, I'm not aware of any issues with the XD line.  My experience with them has been that they are very well built.  My first XD was a used .40 Service model that someone had swapped the stock RSA out with a much lighter one, presumably to shoot lighter competition loadings.  I didn't know any better and shot tons of 155 grain duty ammo through it.  I did this for a couple of years, through many 3-gun matches until a gunsmith at the range I was shooting at saw that the empties were being ejected into the next county and offered to take a look.  Even after that beating, it was none the worse for wear.  I replaced the spring

I have owned the XD-357 sig, XD-9mm Sub, XD-40 and currently own the XDM-45 and XDS-45.  Never had an issue with any of them.  I decided to not clean my XD-9mm sub to see if i could get it to fail once. after about a few months (don't remember round count) I decided I should clean it since I do carry it.
I think they are top notch in their price range.
I also love the new look of the XD hand grips.