palzynski Posted March 30, 2021 Author Share Posted March 30, 2021 9 hours ago, Steve Herschbach said: Funny how different people like different things. I really like the rod on the Apex, though Garrett could upgrade the twist locks. Only brand I’ve seen where those have to be assembled on arrival. But once done, they work. I think the rod is exceptionally stout, no wiggle. The grip and my hand get on just fine. I prefer S rods on detectors under three pounds, so good there. There is actually very little not to like about the Apex, and I am happy to hear this one had a bad coil. My own use of the Apex has been pretty positive, and had me scratching my head in puzzlement at some of the negative reports. Batch of bad coils? ... Concerning the rod , I prefer the Vanquish or Deus telescopic rods . They are faster to assemblei in the field. They can be adjusted very precisely and they are lighter than the Apex rod, at least for the Deus. Just my opinion A quick summary of the Apex pros and cons from my standpoint : ----------------------------------------------------------------------- - The things that I like about the Apex : . excellent iron filtering on iron trashed areas . fast and reactive/accurate on targets . sensitive to tiny targets like small/very small coins as well as bigger ones ( multifrequency ) . the thin control box . simple to use . the excellent MS3 wireless headphones . the excellent Ripper coil - The things that I do not like about the Apex : . the rod . the weight/balance which is good but not as good as a Deus or Orx: ( Apex ripper 1140g , Apex viper 1210g , Deus Orx 800g ) . no dedicated backlight button . the running freq mode ( 5,10,15,20, MF or MS) not displayed on the main detection screen ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------- So globally the results are largely positive up to now .... to be confirmed with more tests ... Ha yes my seller told me he has now a few Apex customers having the false signal issue. He thinks that Garrett had a pb with some of the first hundreds of Apex delivered to customers ... But he does not know exactly the technical reason . Apart from that the weather is warm over here , 22 celsius deg today ... 🙂 4 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GB_Amateur Posted March 30, 2021 Share Posted March 30, 2021 6 hours ago, palzynski said: - The things that I do not like about the Apex : ... . the weight/balance which is good but not as good as a Deus or Orx Given that's about as difficult of an 'opponent' to defeat as there is, this doesn't really sound negative at all to me. (Also, you've shown in previous posts regarding other detectors that you are a tough grader when it comes to weight and balance. 😁) 6 hours ago, palzynski said: - The things that I like about the Apex : . excellent iron filtering on iron trashed areas That is the most intriguing part of your report, IMO. I'm pretty sure Monte has an Apex in his arsenal and I hope he brings it to Wells in June. Either way I'll be interested in hearing his opinion on this capability. Thanks, palzynski, for your objective review. 1 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
palzynski Posted March 30, 2021 Author Share Posted March 30, 2021 42 minutes ago, GB_Amateur said: - The things that I like about the Apex : . excellent iron filtering on iron trashed areas That is the most intriguing part of your report, IMO. I'm pretty sure Monte has an Apex in his arsenal and I hope he brings it to Wells in June. Either way I'll be interested in hearing his opinion on this capability. ... Yes it is for me what makes the difference for me beween the Apex and the ML mulifreqs ( Vanquish , Equinox , Etrac ... ). the Apex is almost silent in high iron trashed areas while the MLs are noisy and quite unstable there . On the other hand the MLs seem to be deeper than the Apex on big coins in low/medium iron trashed areas 4 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Steve Herschbach Posted March 30, 2021 Share Posted March 30, 2021 10 hours ago, palzynski said: Concerning the rod , I prefer the Vanquish or Deus telescopic rods . They are faster to assemblei in the field. They can be adjusted very precisely and they are lighter than the Apex rod, at least for the Deus. Just my opinion I agree. There are a couple rods better than the Apex rod. Maybe 100 that are worse. You are not saying the Apex rod is bad, just not as good as the best of the best. I’m certain most people used to most other detectors would find the Apex rod to be in the upper tiers. How’s that sound? I think we both in general like the Apex, so that’s three people anyway (counting Monte). 1 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Steve Herschbach Posted March 30, 2021 Share Posted March 30, 2021 57 minutes ago, palzynski said: Yes it is for me what makes the difference for me beween the Apex and the ML mulifreqs ( Vanquish , Equinox , Etrac ... ). the Apex is almost silent in high iron trashed areas while the MLs are noisy and quite unstable there . On the other hand the MLs seem to be deeper than the Apex on big coins in low/medium iron trashed areas When you are pushing the edge, that’s the trade you make, and probably where Equinox gets its particular edge. It’s hard to get the best performance while also being stable. The Apex is priced such that stability makes sense, as it is more likely to hit first time users. The Equinox chirpiness puts some people off, but learning to ride the edge with a little noise is where I get what advantage I might have when it comes to detecting. Apex is a trained horse, where Equinox is more bucking bronco. 8 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
palzynski Posted April 8, 2021 Author Share Posted April 8, 2021 I went today with my "new" Apex for a short outing to a third test location to double check that the "false signals " issue has been solved by the new Viper coil sent by the Garrett support . It is an iron infested path in a wood where I have tested the Vanquish 540 a year ago. - First the Apex/Viper is very stable , no more false signals .🙂 - Second I have been very impressed by the Apex , it is almost silent on the iron trash, with sharp beeps on good signals . I confirm that the Apex iron filtering is excellent and better than the MLs Vanquish and Equinox in iron trashed areas. 🙂 It is the third outing with the Viper new coil without any pb , then I consider that this "false signal" issue is now solved. I will continue to test the Apex but will post my reports in a new thread ... 6 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
EL NINO77 Posted April 25, 2021 Share Posted April 25, 2021 https://garrett.com/apex-update-instructions 3 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
67GTA Posted April 26, 2021 Share Posted April 26, 2021 On 4/8/2021 at 2:20 PM, palzynski said: I went today with my "new" Apex for a short outing to a third test location to double check that the "false signals " issue has been solved by the new Viper coil sent by the Garrett support . It is an iron infested path in a wood where I have tested the Vanquish 540 a year ago. - First the Apex/Viper is very stable , no more false signals .🙂 - Second I have been very impressed by the Apex , it is almost silent on the iron trash, with sharp beeps on good signals . I confirm that the Apex iron filtering is excellent and better than the MLs Vanquish and Equinox in iron trashed areas. 🙂 It is the third outing with the Viper new coil without any pb , then I consider that this "false signal" issue is now solved. I will continue to test the Apex but will post my reports in a new thread ... More distinctive tones to better differentiate good targets from iron I am very interested to see how this changes the tones. Got to play with the AT Max last year in heavy iron and some of the lower tones were hard to distinguish from the iron tones. They tended to blend together. The Apex tones sound just like the AT Max to me. Doesn't seem to be enough tonal space between lower tones and iron. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
palzynski Posted April 27, 2021 Author Share Posted April 27, 2021 On 4/25/2021 at 1:08 PM, EL NINO77 said: https://garrett.com/apex-update-instructions Thanks Slavomir for this info , I will do the update as soon as possible . Looks like they have improved the Apex audio , and powering on the backlight when activating the menu is a great idea. 🙂. I had not much time to test the Apex these last days but I plan to do a lot of field testing with it during the coming weeks ... 3 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
palzynski Posted April 27, 2021 Author Share Posted April 27, 2021 19 hours ago, 67GTA said: More distinctive tones to better differentiate good targets from iron I am very interested to see how this changes the tones. Got to play with the AT Max last year in heavy iron and some of the lower tones were hard to distinguish from the iron tones. They tended to blend together. The Apex tones sound just like the AT Max to me. Doesn't seem to be enough tonal space between lower tones and iron. Hi 67GTA , I dont know the AT MAX but I currently own a Deus HF and a Vanquish 540 , so I will be able to compare them with the Apex. At this moment I need a few more hours detecting with the Apex to have a more accurate idea of its ability in iron trashed areas . I will update this thread as soon as I have more field test results ... 4 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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