GPX 6000 - How Do Others Compete?

[geek4gold]

On 1/28/2021 at 8:21 AM, Jonathan Porter said:

Think depth. 😉😇

So the future of gold detecting technology is coming down to digging deeper for smaller gold at depth.

G4G

[Gold Catcher]

25 minutes ago, Randy Lunn said:

The challenge of building a metal detector is optimizing signal to noise. The signal is usually improved by more power and different frequencies to “light up” the gold. Noise reduction is achieved through building “quiet” electronics so no noise is introduced into the system and managing the background noise. Minelab has been granted a patent for “modeling the ground”. The patent covers all possible mathematical algorithms  including several examples given in the patent. This is a clever way of prohibiting competitors from integrating the ground signals into a map of the ground and subtracting out this noise to improve S/N. Minelab will dominate noise reduction through software. Minelab has clearly left the competition in the tailings pile. 

And from what it appears, ML created some really interesting new coils too, exemplified with the 6000 and more probably to come. Who knows, perhaps they start engaging more in coil innovation going forward with the new 14DD being something really unique, to just name a recent example. I have no doubt they could be market leaders in that segment too, considering their expertise, resourcing and ability for mass production. I think Steve talked about that earlier already.  🙂

[Northeast]

1 minute ago, geek4gold said:

So the future of gold detecting technology is coming down to digging deeper for smaller gold at depth.

Yes, but the star chart also showed an improvement across all gold sizes - just not such a big improvement as with the small stuff.  My gut feeling (and hope) is that it will be the 6000's ability to cope with ground noise that brings forward more gold.  

I have just relayed a story to a friend via PM but will put it here as an example. 

About a year ago a mate stumbled upon a little reef that had been well worked by the old timers.  He was looking for 'treasures' and found a 10 gram speccie.  Was joyfully surprised.  Went on to find another speccie and asked me come up with the QED and do it properly.  Well we found a few more bits and a few bits of rubbish as well. We cleaned out as much as we could and altogether had about 45 grams of speccies - real reefy stuff with bits of quartz and iron stone.  

The ground there was real red clay, was usually quite damp and had some problem rocks that the QED would pick up quite easily.  He thought there would be more stuff deeper if we could handle the ground/rocks a bit better and was thinking of getting a GPZ - I agreed that he should  😁

He got the Z and the first day we spent there we found 6 pieces in a small area that had not made a peep on the Equinox or the QED.  The first and largest piece we found was 26 gram deep piece that gave that real nice low-high signal - nice!  BUT, we had to use the GPZ in Severe most of the time and when the ground dried enough we could use Difficult.  At no point have we been able to use Normal properly - even with a very slow swing speed, with a Sensitivity at 1, properly ground and ferrite balanced.  The ground and those pesky rocks just don't allow it. 

Then 5 weeks ago I took my father in law there with his SDC.  I thought we might get some tiny pieces and was hopeful it would handle the ground/rocks better - as I think the SDC is an absolute cracker in this regard.  Well, 3 feet from where the GPZ found the 26 gram piece I got a real nice signal on a piece that ended up being about 5 grams at approx 8 inches in hard packed ground and then another small sub gram piece in the hole.   Why?  Because we could ramp the SDC up to a sensitivity of 5 without an issue. 

Long story but the point is - if the GPX 6000 is combining the best of the SDC (mineralisation handling beast) and the best of the 5000 (depth and versatility) then I'm in  👍

The lighter weight, 2 batteries, ease of use, 2 coils in the package, wireless, speaker built in - all that is very welcome cream on the cake but will mean squat if it isn't better at it's main purpose.  

21 minutes ago, Gold Catcher said:

And from what it sounds it created some really interesting new coils too, exemplified with the 6000 and more probably to come 🙂

Just maybe, yes.   And here we were saying Minelab weren't a very good coil company 😆

 

I have been thinking this for days and keep forgetting to ask - has anyone seen if the GPX 6000 is software updatable? 

[mungass]

hey North East do you know how to post a facebook clip on here ? cant work it out , some bendigo seekers gold , can messenger the clip to ya .

[Northeast]

21 minutes ago, mungass said:

know how to post a facebook clip on here

I'm certainly not the person to ask  🤣  I thought all video clips had to first be on Youtube and then linked to here?   But really I have no idea. 

[Steve Herschbach]

Use the share or embed function for all YouTube and Facebook video, and paste the information provided into the forum edit box. The video should appear. I try to fix instances where that has not been done but a link posted instead.

[PhaseTech]

How do others compete? If you mean other brands, well I'm still waiting for any other company to beat even a GP extreme for depth in mineralised ground. Ah, maybe make it a bit easier. How about the tired old SD2100. That should be an easier challenge. 5 gram nugget in mineralised ground, 14 or 15" round mono coil on the SD2100. Can any other non-Minelab detector match it?? Surely another company has been able to match a machine that came out in 1996!?? I highly doubt it.... but there's the challenge. Could be a very interesting experiment. 

[Swegin]

5 hours ago, PhaseTech said:

How do others compete? If you mean other brands, well I'm still waiting for any other company to beat even a GP extreme for depth in mineralised ground. Ah, maybe make it a bit easier. How about the tired old SD2100. That should be an easier challenge. 5 gram nugget in mineralised ground, 14 or 15" round mono coil on the SD2100. Can any other non-Minelab detector match it?? Surely another company has been able to match a machine that came out in 1996!?? I highly doubt it.... but there's the challenge. Could be a very interesting experiment. 

So a QED can't match a 2100?  I don't know I don't own one but I thought I read that a QED could match a 5000.  

 

[Steve Herschbach]

9 hours ago, PhaseTech said:

How do others compete? If you mean other brands, well I'm still waiting for any other company to beat even a GP extreme for depth in mineralised ground. Ah, maybe make it a bit easier. How about the tired old SD2100. That should be an easier challenge. 5 gram nugget in mineralised ground, 14 or 15" round mono coil on the SD2100. Can any other non-Minelab detector match it?? Surely another company has been able to match a machine that came out in 1996!?? I highly doubt it.... but there's the challenge. Could be a very interesting experiment. 

You got that right Nenad, spot on. I discuss that at length here. Even have my own rough scale for reference.

Looks like the GPX is going to satisfy half my challenge, but price, not so much. Won’t know though until we know what the spare coil and spare power pack are worth, but that could be inflating the price by a cool grand. I have no idea but in general Minelab accessory prices go hand in hand with the machine price.

[Aureous]

15 hours ago, PhaseTech said:

How do others compete? If you mean other brands, well I'm still waiting for any other company to beat even a GP extreme for depth in mineralised ground. Ah, maybe make it a bit easier. How about the tired old SD2100. That should be an easier challenge. 5 gram nugget in mineralised ground, 14 or 15" round mono coil on the SD2100. Can any other non-Minelab detector match it?? Surely another company has been able to match a machine that came out in 1996!?? I highly doubt it.... but there's the challenge. Could be a very interesting experiment. 

A very objective challenge... all depends on target size, coil size and ground conditions. Ive had a Whites TDI beat my 4500 on a multi-gram target (lead) in heavily mineralised ground by a decent margin. The ATX I briefly owned, detected numerous small bits of gold in a patch I heavily gridded. The QED did the same, on the same spot. Overall though, on most targets, in most conditions, Minelab products have the edge for sure. Their dominance in the PI prospecting detector market has been protected by clever and wise patents and feverishly improved by a well funded R&D dept. Dual channel (MPS) tech along with their Ground Tracking tech etc etc has kept the competition at arms length who seem to be unable or unwilling to spend the necessary $$ to actually innovate and keep up with Minelab in this section of the marketplace. No sign of that changing anytime soon.