X-Cart Ecommerce Software – Shopping Cart Solution

We at PostHits classify all our software reviews into to distinct categories; For Sale & Open Source.   X-Cart falls into the For Sale Category, and although the price tag on this starts at a mere $229.00, don’t let this price fool you.  

X-cart is one of the most powerful ecommerce software packages currently available on the market.  It is well made, 100% supported, and the company that has made it also has ISO9001 certification.  It has all of the standards you would expect from a more higher priced piece of software.  Things like W3C XHTML 1.0 Transitional compliant code, Multi language capability, integrated search, integrated realtime shipping calculations, an extensive list of payment gateway support, 100% Template based, SEO Friendly, & loads of options to customize; meaning once you decide to go with x-cart, in the long run it will carry. If you are a Canadian or Canadian based business looking for an ecommerce solution, X-Cart has native support for Canada. It has GST and PST already built in, and supports Canada Post’s online Realtime Shipping module.

We won’t get into all of the features of X-cart but you can see a full list on their website at www.x-cart.com .

X-Cart is available in two versions. X-cart Gold ($299.00)  and X-cart Pro ($575.00)

X-Cart Pro extends features of X-Cart Gold by adding specific functionalities:

• Unlimited number of isolated provider/seller accounts
• Sellers/providers can edit only products belonging to them
• Different providers/sellers can set their own shipping rates for pre-defined shipping methods
• Admin account is separated from provider/seller accounts
• Independent tax settings for providers/sellers

X-Cart Pro is ideal for:

• Online store selling products from multiple suppliers.
• Web-supermarket with several departments.
• Online distributor/wholesaler.
• Internet mall with joint catalog.

If your just getting started, we would suggest going with X-Cart Gold and upgrading to the Pro version when your more comfortable with using x-cart or you feel it meets your needs.

Purchasing X-Cart 

There are 3 ways to purchase X-Cart.  

1. Buy the actual X-Cart software directly
2. Go on one of their recently announced hosting packages
3. Purchase X-Cart Software or X-Cart Hosted from an X-Cart Authorized Reseller

Installing X-Cart is a cinch if you use their online step by step guide.

If you want to setup a temp host until your site is ready, we would suggest registering a domain for the temp website at www.GoDaddy.com and signing up for one of their Economy Hosting Plans. It meets X-Cart’s Requirements and starts from $3.99 monthly. 

One of the things we loved about X-Cart was the different options we had for support.  Upon purchase, you will get a login into an exclusive X-Cart owners & users forum.  We found this to be a fabulous resource as a lot of the questions we had in how to customize X-Cart were already asked by several users, and the forum moderators stay on top of things by keeping everything organized neatly.  The forums also gave us an opportunity to find cut & paste code for free X-Cart Modifications, and value words of guidance & wisdom from X-Cart veterans and their doings.

There are many X-Cart add on’s available which are commonly referred to as X-Cart mods.  You’ll see what’s available for X-Cart mods by either Googling or their forum.  If your pressed for time and need your X-Cart website customized asap..you can contact X-Cart via email or US Toll Free as they do provide customization services globally.

One of the must have X-Cart mods we purchased was from a company named TelaFirma.  They have a mod for X-Cart that automatically resizes images for your product pages, and thumbnails (which was a most definite time saver).

The main areas that will require customization on X-Cart after initial purchase are:

Site Layout and Site Theming ( Based on the look your business wants)

The Checkout Process (The default X-Cart Checkout Process takes too long)

Telefirma’s Dynamic Images Module (For Image Formatting)

Alot of people have been very close to buying X-Cart..but because of the checkout process being so cumbersome, people have gone for something else. I was at an SEO meeting a few months back, and some of the people i talked with there said they would have gone for X-Cart as it had everything they were looking for..except the checkout process sucked..and the consensus was oscommerce.  Nevertheless, there is a lot of support for X-Cart available, and there is an X-Cart One Page Checkout Module that (at the time of this writing) is almost near completion.  Given the choice between going with oscommerce and X-Cart with a one page checkout..I would spend the money required and go with X-Cart undeniably.

Being a business owner, I like the idea that X-Cart has been around for a while and is there for me if needed.  If your website guy goes MIA, or something goes wrong…you can always give them a call. X-Cart has been around for a while..and as a result they get their gravy.