Jump to content

Is The Weighting And Algorithm Of Park 1 And Field 1 The Same?


Recommended Posts

When I first started testing with my Equinox 800, I tried various small gold items. A couple of them (notably an 18K tiny link bracelet) would only be seen by the Gold modes, and Field 2. None of the other modes would pick it up regardless of settings. I've had stud earrings test the same way.

Link to comment
Share on other sites


On 8/8/2020 at 12:22 PM, Steve Herschbach said:

Do I think Park 1 and Field 1 are the same if set exactly the same? Yes. Can a swear I know for a fact this is true? No. Same goes for Park 2 and Field 2, plus Gold 1 and Gold 2.

  1. Park 1 / Field 1
  2. Park 2 / Field 2
  3. Gold 1 / Gold 2
  4. Beach 1
  5. Beach 2

Wow, lots of replies for me to catch up on.  So I only have the 600 so have ignored reading about the gold modes but I understood/interpreted the same by the description provided of each mode in the manual. The “1” modes and “2” modes in park and field having the same weighting with different settings while the beach modes were uniquely different. 
 

I’ll have to read through the comments with more time and watch the videos but it seems like others have observed differences with some A-B-A tests. I guess I will also have try myself. 
 

Again, my thought was that, if it was known, I could just reduce the number of variables in settings and just create some similar modes that varied depending on the coil I was using. It is simple enough to adjust the settings when I swap the coil. Just a lot if things to remember...  I may have to just make some notes on settings I am trying/what seems to work for me.

For now, I have set all the park and field modes to 5 tones, iron bias of 2, ground balance of 0 (the manual actually recommends running Park  and Field modes at 0 GB), with all metal on (eliminates my need to change notching differences and I don’t dig that low anyway). I think they are all recovery speed 3 by default. I do hope to cover same ground with the 6” and lower the iron bias and hopefully unmask some stuff I may have missed with the 11” and iron bias on, maybe also lower my recovery speed and slow down more.  


 

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I think it will be pretty apparent if you do your own A-B comparisons with equivalent settings, you will notice differences between the two "1" and the two "2" modes.  It appears that all 4 of these modes use the same frequency combinations (7.8 khz + 39 khz) based on signal analyzer readings but each mode appears to be processing the raw target signal differently independent of the default user settings. 

On a related note, I always wondered whether it made a difference which mode you entered single frequency from.  In other words, did 5 khz, 10 khz, etc. SF behave the same way regardless of whether you entered it from Park 1 or Field 2 (again presuming all the user settings were set the same on both "parent" modes before you entered SF).  My conclusion before v3 was that SF behaves the same way (i.e., signal processing is equivalent) regardless how you get there.  I think this is still true even though 4 khz appears to have "something different" going on vs. the other SF's.  This means the SF's are probably "generic" so you can start from any mode to set up a "reference" single frequency interrogation mode that you might want to store in the user profile slot.

Table from the user guide attached that shows the default settings for each mode for general reference:

 

SmartSelect_20200812-071746_Drive.jpg

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Strange Minelab won't tell us what frequencies are in each mode.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

11 hours ago, nickeldNdimed said:

I think they are all recovery speed 3 by default.

No -- see the tables Chase posted right below your recent post, or look in the manual = User Guide (that's where he got them).

Also, "iron bias of 2" is ambiguous because there are (since the v2.x update) two different Iron Bias scales, the original FE and the newer F2.  And the two settings (or any iron bias digital value) means something different in each one.

As far as ground balance value of 0 being the 'recommended' (in the manual) setting for Park and field modes, there was considerable discussion here about that a couple years ago when the Equinox was released.  I think this is one of those "let's be generic for the newcomers as the more experienced users will do what they want, anyway" kind of statements.

I find the ML Equinox Manual quite useful and informative, up to a point.  I guess if they told us everything they know, besides that being bad from a proprietary standpoint, it would be 600 pages instead of 60.  Just keep in mind that most experienced users ground balance their detectors (Equinox included) just about every time they turn it on, and particularly every time they change sites.

Default settings are good for a while.  But when comfortable with those, I recommend branching out, preferrably just changing one or two things at a time between hunts.  You can always easily reset individual modes or even the entire detector (see User Guide) back to factory defaults if you happen to make so many changes you freefall into a bottomless pit.

The question about differences between park/field/beach/(gold) and subsequently 1 vs. 2 in each is a good one, and as you have seen, isn't unanimously agreed upon even by experienced detectorists.  No one should any longer expect ML to help us out on that one as they've been radio silent for 2 1/2 years.

  • Like 2
Link to comment
Share on other sites

On 8/12/2020 at 12:04 PM, GB_Amateur said:

No -- see the tables Chase posted right below your recent post, or look in the manual = User Guide (that's where he got them).

Also, "iron bias of 2" is ambiguous because there are (since the v2.x update) two different Iron Bias scales, the original FE and the newer F2.  And the two settings (or any iron bias digital value) means something different in each one.

As far as ground balance value of 0 being the 'recommended' (in the manual) setting for Park and field modes, there was considerable discussion here about that a couple years ago when the Equinox was released.  I think this is one of those "let's be generic for the newcomers as the more experienced users will do what they want, anyway" kind of statements.

I find the ML Equinox Manual quite useful and informative, up to a point.  I guess if they told us everything they know, besides that being bad from a proprietary standpoint, it would be 600 pages instead of 60.  Just keep in mind that most experienced users ground balance their detectors (Equinox included) just about every time they turn it on, and particularly every time they change sites.

Default settings are good for a while.  But when comfortable with those, I recommend branching out, preferrably just changing one or two things at a time between hunts.  You can always easily reset individual modes or even the entire detector (see User Guide) back to factory defaults if you happen to make so many changes you freefall into a bottomless pit.

The question about differences between park/field/beach/(gold) and subsequently 1 vs. 2 in each is a good one, and as you have seen, isn't unanimously agreed upon even by experienced detectorists.  No one should any longer expect ML to help us out on that one as they've been radio silent for 2 1/2 years.

Yes, I am familiar with the chart and the manual. I guess I should clarify, I’ve only been comparing the Park and Field modes per my original question and those are all recovery speed 3 by default. In regards to iron bias, I should clarify that I have both FE and FE2 set at 2 at the moment and have only detected with the FE setting and have not tried FE2.

What you suggest is exactly what I am trying to do and what led to the question.

First I started with the presets, park 1, then Park 2, then Field 1 and only changed all to 5 tones. I mostly noticed I was not finding much more in previously scanned areas with park 1 but was digging a lot more iron junk that sounded good..  I noticed the major difference being the iron bias at 2 for park 1 and the others at 0.

Second, I decided to set all of them for FE iron bias mode of value 2.  This “fixed” finding the iron junk and sort of equalized the modes in that regard.
 

Third, that then led me to re-read the mode descriptions and to the question of “are the 1 modes and 2 modes weighted the same? Can I eliminate that variable or is that another variable?”  No straight answer to this on on the FB pages or the forums. This forum has been the closest to being informative and acknowledging of “we are not sure” rather than those that are certain that they are not because “why would Minelab do that or I just know they are different”.

So I appreciate the discussion.  Sounds like some of you have tried to come to your own conclusions in various ways and I’ll have to do the same.  My girlfriend loves when I spend hours with my baggies of junk and detector making noise.... I have to try some air stuff first and then find a place where I can burry a few things and try again. My approach is to make them all as simple/similar as possible and then work my way back one by one through the settings to understand how each benefits me.

Anyway, I got a sweet deal on a used 6” and want to try it eventually over same areas and back down the iron bias and see if I missed anything in between that iron junk.  
 

Back to work for now..


 

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

On 8/12/2020 at 9:04 AM, GB_Amateur said:

 

On 8/11/2020 at 9:12 PM, nickeldNdimed said:

I think they are all recovery speed 3 by default.

No -- see the tables Chase posted right below your recent post, or look in the manual = User Guide (that's where he got them).

 

Chuck,

Chase was referencing an older copy of the Equinox manual in his post yesterday...In the latest manual, the default Nox 600 recovery speed for all its available modes is in fact 3.

The latest Nox manual, AFAIK, is 4901-0249-6-EN.

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

1 hour ago, Raphis said:

Chase was referencing an older copy of the Equinox manual in his post yesterday...In the latest manual, the default Nox 600 recovery speed for all its available modes is in fact 3.

Thanks, Rahphis.  Yes, I realized that after reading nickeledNdimed's latest post.  Minelab could have made it easy on all of us by just allowing {2,4,6} settings on the 600.  That wouldn't have provided any extra performance for their intentional 'tone-down' features for the 600 but would have reduced untold headaches and misunderstandings for us.  Oh, but they read this site so maybe they'll fix it next time.  😉

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now
×
×
  • Create New...