Swinging The Equinox At Partner Conference

[Lunk]

I was fortunate enough to be invited to the annual Minelab Partner Conference in Phoenix that was just held during January 14th to 16th. And I was lucky enough to swing the Equinox 800 under the tutelage of its godfather, Minelab Engineer and Product Technical Manager Mark Lawrie at the GPAA Golden Dreams mining claim near Morristown, Arizona. Being composed of tertiary volcanic rocks and soils, this area is extremely noisy, making it very difficult for most VLF gold machines to cope with. Using a small 2-grain test nugget buried at 2 inches, Mark and I adjusted settings on the EQX to get the most distinct target signal from the test nugget relative to the ground response. Although the Nox performed admirably in these exteme ground conditions, finding many small bits of lead and brass bullet shrapnel that litters the area, suffice it to say that I won’t be trading off my Gold Monster 1000 anytime soon. Granted I only was able to swing the EQX for half a day and would need a lot more time to get familiar with its capabilities, and I’m sure it would fare much better in search of small gold nuggets in non-volcanic soil types. As far as I could tell, the Equinox 800 was running the latest software version, as the Gold Mode had the multi frequency option available.

[dewcon4414]

That said........ as an all around machine which would you grab?   Im not unrealistic about what its going to do in the water either..... but its one upped the competition like Deus and AT pro by being salt water ready.   Its going to be a great general purpose machine that some-timers can afford.   I dont do much raw gold or dirt hunting any more...... but its sure nice to see one we compare to TOP DOG detectors in each category.   How much lighter did it swing did some of those lunker gold machines?    I think Steve is right thou..... they may need some better suited coils for gold hunting now.  Great report....... i suspect in the next week we will start hearing more from the testers as well.

Dew

[Chase Goldman]

Great report.  Just getting the machine to run stable under those conditions is an accomplishment, not to mention being able to recover legitimate targets (desirable or not).  I believe that if the default frequency mode under gold mode was multi IQ, then you were likely running the latest sw version.  Steve can correct me, but I don't think gold mode was ever precluded from running in multi IQ, but the default was single frequency (20 or 40 khz) originally. I believe the only mode that is limited in that regard is beach mode which is limited to multi IQ only.  Thanks for the report.

[Mountain Mike]

Hey guys new to this forum. But this is why I joined. Simple, honest tests and reviews of this new machine. I will admit I do have high expectations for this machine. Technology is getting cheaper everyday. Just looking at what you get in a cell phone, TV, and computer compared to a few years ago for the same money. My main interests in this machine are the weight and ability to find good targets in heavy iron. Cant wait to see more reports in the iron. Although I am looking forward to trying to find some gold.

[TedinVT]

A link from Minelab Worldwide Users Group indicating end of Jan. shipping, early to mid Feb. receiving.

Release Date - Will Ship from Australia to USA end of January!
We should start getting our first shipments from Minelab early to mid February and will be shipping them out to you as we come to your name on our list of preorders.

[Steve Herschbach]

Thanks for the report Lunk. Same old story - hard to beat dedicated gold prospecting detectors designed for a single function with machines designed to achieve many functions. The Gold Monster excels on tiny gold and is still my first choice for that particular task. The pure simplicity of the thing makes it a better tool for a person who only cares about small gold nuggets, nothing else.

Chase, Gold Mode started as having only the 20 kHz and 40 kHz options. That was reported on before you became a member here. Then MF was added as an option.

Minelab has previously stated machines will ship by end of January. Some people interpreted that to mean detectors would be in hand before end of January, but the reality is nothing has changed as regards announced delivery times.

[Chase Goldman]

45 minutes ago, Steve Herschbach said:

Chase, Gold Mode started as having only the 20 kHz and 40 kHz options. That was reported on before you became a member here. Then MF was added as an option.

Thanks, Steve.  So Gold Mode has gone through at least 3 “visible” iterations, then (single frequency only, single frequency default with multi option, and finally multi freq default with single freq option), correct?  I say visible meaning an obvious user interface tweak vs. whatever else ML is tweaking under the hood with the Multi IQ implementation algorithm for Gold Mode.

[Steve Herschbach]

Gold Mode started out with 20 and 40 kHz options. MF was added and made the default. To me that was one change but if you want to make it two that’s fine 

[Chase Goldman]

Sorry, guess I’m splitting hairs but just trying to get a handle on the Gold Mode SW version Lunk was using.  I latched on to his statement that Multi was an option (vs. stating it was the default) which could have meant it was earlier than when ML recently made Multi the default setting.  Guess I was mistaken that there was an interim iteration.   Thanks for correcting my misinformation.  

It’s hard being on the outside and trying to piece the bits of info together to get the big picture or to correlate operational reviews especially when the target is moving (e.g., the “recent” change to Gold Mode) and as ML trickles the info out in multi part bog posts. So bear with us not in the know folks just trying to differentiate between fact and fiction as we piece the puzzle together.

Why bother now when all will be revealed once it is released?  Because I am aiming to get a running start on understanding this beast so I can minimize the learning curve in the field once it finally delivers.

Plus as an engineer, I tend to go a little overboard on precision in communicating technical information.  My apologies.

[Steve Herschbach]

No apology required Chase. Try being on the inside trying to relay accurate information while not getting tripped up by final tweaks and tuning. That is why I keep saying over and over again to people certain things have to wait for final shipping versions to appear. Anything else is premature at best and misleading at worst. It’s a fine line to tread.

No doubt Mark Lawrie was employing the latest firmware versions and observing dealer responses and feedback which could result in another tweak. He would be an idiot not to take advantage of such a situation and Mark is no idiot - far from it.