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Gold Monster 1000 Or Equinox 800?


ks1652

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1 hour ago, ks1652 said:

Thank you GotAU. This is exactly the experienced user information I am looking for. I appreciate you for taking time to educate me and any other readers thinking about picking up one of these detectors

Some other great input here though- as a prospecting detector, Gold Catcher makes some very good points why one may want a GM over a Nox. In my case, I bought the GM first and really liked it for looking for gold and meteorites.  I even used it at a dry salt lake and it did well there. I then bought the Nox to do some relic hunting and as a second gold detector to share with my wife and other family members.  But some of the areas that I wanted to prospect have a lot of ironstone and other hot rocks, and I also ran into a lot of the basalt hot rocks out in Franconia, Az while looking for meteorites.  It was a bit harder there to find stuff with the GM. After that, I started reading about the positive reviews the 24k was getting, and got to try one out with Jim McCulloch for a day- that sold me on keeping the 24k over the GM, especially after using it in areas with lots of gravel sized hot rocks and layers of black sand. I also decided to keep the more versatile Nox as I also want a relic/coin detector.

I guess what it comes down to is if you are only going to be prospecting for gold, the gold monster is probably a good choice for you, but if you think you might want to try some other types of detecting, especially if you don’t live close to a good prospecting area, you may find yourself wanting to go swing for other things besides shiny stuff and will be more happy with something like the multipurpose  Nox.

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5 hours ago, Sérgio Campos said:

Hey ks!
My experience is with the monster. It’s the only machine I have detect with. My hunting ground is schist rocks and the machine It is very stable and I can use it between the 7 and 8 “gain”. When the ground changes you need to adjust the gain or “pump” say about ten times and just keep going. I also use the “auto plus” combined with the manual for target verification.
It’s fairly light weighted and after a couple of ours I need 10 minutes to recover my arm stamina. Very good battery life, at least 12 hours!? Pretty awesome machine!! It will detect crazy small bits. It has two coils and I prefer the larger coil because for scouting because it’s not as sensible and will skip bird shotgun pellets.
What I miss is target ID ( which I believe the NOX has).

I hunt for gold nuggets and often I will dig nails from old cow shoes 🙂 - something I discover from detecting is that in the old days they would do it!-  and these are made of a metal that often is mixed and gives strong non ferrous signals. If I had target ID I would skip those. The monster does give sound variations easy to identify in swallow targets but for deeper targets the variation is not as noticeable. 
The monster works for my current gold, which is gold 🙂 but because I need depth my future detector will be a PI. 
Anyway, if I was to decide for another VLF I will go for something with good target ID. Say a NOX or a Legend?

Hope this info helped. 

Here is a photo of a “Cowshoe”  for future memory… Cheerio!
 

A9EB9069-2BA4-4874-8996-3F1D132C11E2.jpeg

Great review Sergio and the information you provided matches a lot of remarks I'm finding on the web. Thank you for responding.

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4 minutes ago, GotAU? said:

Some other great input here though- Gold Catcher makes some very good points why one may want a GM over a Nox. In my case, I bought the GM first and really liked it for gold and meteorites.  I even used it for meteorites at a dry salt lake and it did well. I then bought the Nox to do some relic hunting and as a second gold detector to share with my wife and other family members.  Some of the areas that I wanted to prospect have a lot of ironstone and other hot rocks, and I also ran into a lot of the basalt hot rocks out in Franconia, Az while looking for meteorites there too with the GM. After that, I started reading about the positive reviews about the 24k, and for to try one out with Jim McCulloch for a day- that sold me on keeping the 24k over the GM, especially after using it in areas with lots of gravel sized hot rocks and layers of black sand. I also decided to keep the more versatile Nox as I also want a relic/coin detector.

I guess what it comes down to is if you are only going to be prospecting for gold, the gold monster is probably a good choice for you, but if you think you might want to try some other types of detecting, especially if you don’t live close to a good prospecting area, you may find yourself wanting to go swing for other things besides shiny stuff and will be more happy with something like the multipurpose  Nox.

We have the same interest in gold and meteorites. Not saying coins and relics don't interest me. It's the Buzzards fault I have gold fever. Living in Reno NV has me a couple of hours away from some really good gold locations. My house is just below Virginia City and there are a number of sites to hike to that look interesting. When I'm out detecting or drywashing I have my eyes open for anything. I like the target ID feature of the Equinox and I'm impressed with the nugget finding capabilities of the Monster. The auto features of the Monster are appealing. What I may consider eventually is picking up both detectors if I can gain approval from the finance czar before I slip the noose around my neck! Thank you for your experience and insights

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16 minutes ago, ks1652 said:

Great review Sergio and the information you provided matches a lot of remarks I'm finding on the web. Thank you for responding.

I've never seen a cowshoe before. I can only imagine the sound the piece let go with. The nails probably sounded off insanely as well. One of the areas I have hit a few times is covered in boot tacks and those turned my DMX into sound machine. 

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2 hours ago, Gold Catcher said:

 I happen to like the GM as part of a larger fleet of PI/ZVT detectors and it fits my VLF-gold needs perfectly. 

my feelings exactly.  I'll never know how good the Nox is because I love that Monster too much to switch.

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5 minutes ago, oneguy said:

my feelings exactly.  I'll never know how good the Nox is because I love that Monster too much to switch.

What to do??? I think the best option is to acquire both over time. The features offered by both detectors give a lot of flexibilty when terrain or ground conditions change. Theres no doubt both are fantastic machines. Getting my hands on one of these will fill in the gap when conditions require me to lay down the Gold Bug 2 which is a perfect machine for the Rye Patch area where rumor has it that most of the gold is small flakes and in the top 4 to 6 inches of soil.

I hope to validate that statement soon. I appreciate your input! 

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50 minutes ago, GotAU? said:

 

I guess what it comes down to is if you are only going to be prospecting for gold, the gold monster is probably a good choice for you, but if you think you might want to try some other types of detecting, especially if you don’t live close to a good prospecting area, you may find yourself wanting to go swing for other things besides shiny stuff and will be more happy with something like the multipurpose  Nox.

GotAU summed it up best....

 

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Thanks Jeff, you said it better than me. I really hate typing on my phone.  I have all three and rarely use the GM or GB2 as I find the Nox better and far more versatile.  I can even nugget detect creeks without worrying about getting it wet being the only waterproof one of the three, not to mention its wireless audio that the others don't have. 

As for sensitivity I've not seen any evidence with my detecting of the GM being more sensitive to small gold, I have however noticed the tiniest bit of extra small gold performance with the GB2 but the gold is so small at that point it really doesn't matter, may as well use a gold pan as you'd find a lot more of it quicker. 

I've found as small as 0.001 of a gram with the Nox, how small is too small? 

You also have multi frequency and single frequencies to get the best out of it, 20 kHz can be good for bigger deeper gold, 40 for the small stuff and multi for general use.  My Nox made my GM redundant. 

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