Minelab, What The Heck Did You Do To My Equinox?????

[Jeff McClendon]

Minelab, What the bleep did you do to my Equinox?

This is going to be a rant. Hopefully I will be able to keep it clean and factual.

Today, April 25, 2023 I completed the first 100 hours of moderate to high iron mineralization turf hunting for coins and jewelry with the Equinox 900. I also have 30 hours of gold prospecting and 10 hours of saltwater beach hunting so far with the Equinox 900.

I thoroughly enjoyed gold prospecting with the Equinox 900 using the 6” and Coiltek 10X5” coils. It performed like I am used to with the Equinox 800 using its two Gold modes set for multi frequency operation.

My saltwater beach hunts at Los Angeles and San Diego area beaches were inconclusive, mostly because of bad weather (very few people out) and sanded in conditions.

So I am going to try to give a review of the Equinox 900 from my experiences with it on land for coin and jewelry detecting in moderate to high iron mineralization at local parks with varying degrees of steel alloy and aluminum trash where even modern coins can be down to 8” deep.

I really like the upgraded shaft system, new hand grip angle design, new arm cuff, thicker 11” coil ears and hopefully the new waterproofed control housing of my Equinox 900. I also really like the vibrating hand grip feature along with its customization provided on the 900. Plus, I really like the seemingly improved iron handling and the definitely improved target separation and recovery speed. Depth seems to be a bit better. Sensitivity has been increased from 25 to 28. EMI mitigation is similar to the 800.

The ML85 headphones are a slight improvement to me as far as being less muffled and bass heavy compared to the ML80s. They do not offer the best ambient noise prevention compared to some other manufacturer provided wireless headphones or the most balanced sound quality. They do pair easily. I do notice some wireless signal drop outs if I turn me head quickly, etc.

The display, backlight (red) and user interface are mostly unchanged from the 800. I still wish the 900 had more than one User Profile.

The onboard pinpoint function is much more stable than the wonky pinpoint activity built into the 600 and 800. It does have a form of real-time target ID also while in pinpoint mode.

The addition of Depth Tones or ferrous/non-ferrous 2 tone VCO audio for the Park, Field and Beach modes seemed like a nice addition. I have no problem with the VCO ferrous tone. The VCO non-ferrous tone sounds really bad through my ML85s with lots of incongruous drop outs and strangled, inconsistent, ridiculously high tones.

Alright, anybody that knows me personally or knows me from these forums knows how much I like to outright rabidly love the Equinox 800 even with its questionable waterproofing, stock shaft build quality, pinpoint function/non function and its compressed low to mid conductor target IDs.

I hunt in many public areas that are drought prone so these municipalities only allow coin popping/screwdriver target recovery. Big fines and possible confiscation of equipment if a person is caught digging with a shovel of any kind in these public areas. Accurate target IDs are essential for me in these areas along with accurate tones and accurate tone quality.

So, I spent another 3 hours of my life today, using the Equinox 900 at a very modern trashed park that I have repeatedly hunted over the last four years. I will give the Equinox 900 credit. I did find 11 clad dimes and 13 pre 1982 copper Memorial pennies which were in the 4” to 8” deep range. These could have easily been silver dimes and earlier pennies. I have pulled many silver Roosevelt dimes out of this park along with some Mercury dimes, wheat pennies and Indian head pennies. I also found 6 modern nickels that I had missed. I will chalk those finds up to the improved Equinox 900 target separation and recovery speed.

Did I have a good time using the Equinox 900. Absolutely not.

If I had been blindfolded and someone handed me a detector that I could only use 5 tone audio for target ID, I would have guessed the detector I was using was a Garrett Apex or the new X-Terra Pro in 5 kHz. Target audio was all over the place even on shallow targets. The actual numerical target IDs were too of course, even on shallow targets.

I had my 900 setup for 5 tone operation with tone breaks set at -19 to 0 for iron, 1 to 23 for low conductor aluminum foil, small can slaw and small gold jewelry, a small US nickel bin from 24 to 27, all sorts of pull-tabs and aluminum trash and zinc pennies from 28 to 69, and the rest of the US high conductor coins and silver jewelry bin from 70 to 99. I also double checked many of the clad dimes and copper pennies before digging using the AT full tones audio setting.

I was using Park 1 Multi, sensitivity 25 of 28, ground balance and EMI noise reduction performed, accepted -9 to +99 target IDs, 5 tones, threshold tone OFF, iron audio volume level set high enough to clearly hear it through headphones, recovery speed 5, iron bias 1 which was enough to make most steel crown bottle caps have some iron tone audio and tonal breakup.

This is what I experienced……..

- 4”+ deep flat laying clad dimes and copper pennies were triple beeping during left/right DD coil passes as if they were on the surface.

- Target IDs for those 24 high conductor coins were ranging from 68 to 98 during normal sweeps circling those coin targets whether they were 4” deep or 8” deep with very little possibility of telling the difference between a clad dime and copper Memorial penny.

- Those target audio responses were crossing over a user set audio tone break.

- The wide target ID range was not caused by co-located targets…..it happened on every one of the 11 clad dimes and 13 95% copper pennies.

- Soil conditions were slightly moist but nothing unusual.

- Surface to 4” deep US nickels had target IDs from 23 to 28 during sweeps around the targets so tone audio encompassed three user set tone bins.

- Switching to full tones had zero effect on tone accuracy or target ID accuracy.

- Similar audio and tone behavior happened on various types of pull-tabs, can slaw, aluminum bottle caps and of course steel alloy bottle caps.

Basically, I could have had similar results using the Equinox 900 set on 10 kHz. Target ID and tone stability were non-existent compared to the Equinox 800 in Park 1 with similar settings. The kaleidoscope of sounds produced on beginner level basic targets in 5 tones or all tones was a joke. Single digit notching might as well have been 5 digit notching since basic targets had at least 5 or more different but repeatable target IDs instead of the 1 to 3 standard target IDs seen detecting the same targets using the Equinox 800.

Sure, I wanted a slightly expanded target ID range update on the Equinox 600/800. Nokta got it just about right by adding an extra 10 target IDs between the ferrous/non ferrous tone break (ID +11) and the mid to high conductor tone break around +40 on the Legend.

Minelab, why did you instead go from 50 total target IDs to 120? Whose bright idea was that? Who field tested these detectors for overall target ID accuracy and stability?

This hunt today WAS NOT AN ISOLATED INCIDENT or one off. It has been this way for me since hour number 1 of coin and jewelry detecting in my area.

I still have an Equinox 800. I have used the new, improved coil ear 11" coil that came with my 900 on my 800 with no issues. Using the 10X5" Coiltek on my 900 does little to improve target ID accuracy and multi tone stability.

There have been rumors and some indications that a software update may be in the works for the Manticore.

For heaven sakes Minelab, offer one on the Equinox 700/900 too for target ID stability!

I am not looking for answers or advice from anyone on this forum about what I wrote and experienced. If you want to agree or disagree with what I have experienced, that is totally fine. Just don't try to theorize, pontificate or otherwise tell me I don't know what I'm doing. Even though I only have 100+ hours on the Equinox 900, I know how to use this detector.

Minelab, you are welcome to write a response explaining this detector behavior.

thanks for reading if you made it this far.

 

Sorry for the long post and the rant.

[bigtim1973]

Well I made it all the way through and for the heck of it......maybe just maybe there was some kind of weird emi interference going in with it being in a park. Some days are good and some are not. 

I went ahead and pulled the trigger today with getting a eq900 by trading off my deus 2. 

Now waiting for the big truck to show up.

Now I know we have shared some messages back and forth with what your thoughts are between the 2 units. 

And as you have said....you personally would not have done the swap...from your own detecting experiences between the 2 units. 

They speak a different language but as you said...there is enough between the 2 to make them similar in performance. 

Maybe your experience was like you have said already....a one time experience that may resolve itself.

Maybe the park you were in recently sprayed some kind of fertilizer and the fresh coating of minerals and such have not been absorbed enough into the ground. 

I have saw others complain about a similar issue on other forums. 

But this has not deterred me from making the change.

I do not think this reply of mine is gonna make you feel any better about the results you had while using your new 900 today but someone else may chime in and give you some food for thought.

I know you are the type of fellow that takes the time to try to figure out why a machine ticks the way it does.

So I am gonna kick back and see where this thread goes..

[Jeff McClendon]

Instead of this being a one-time issue, like I said in the write-up, I have seen this behavior since hour number one of coin and jewelry hunting use in at least 20 different area parks that are in 4 different cities with 4 different staffs and ground maintenance strategies. This was not an isolated occurrence.

Also, there were no EMI issues at this park today. If there had been the display would have been going nuts with lots of target IDs showing up when I was not moving the coil.  I would not have been able to run this Equinox 900 at 25 sensitivity if there was an EMI problem.

[schoolofhardNox]

Even on the Manticore I have similar results. For a company that stressed how great the target ID was, it is not. Expanding the range made it worse. The E Trac had way better Target ID than any of the new models. I find the Manticore ups the target ID on copper cents when they are deep to 98 or 99. Way higher than they should be. I don't know if your 900 does that as well. I like the Manticore but it seems it is only good at certain sites. I want to say non EMI sites, but it has worked well on some of those too. Kind of hit or miss on if it's going to work or not. I bring it along but hardly ever pull it out to use. Getting a bit more than disappointed in Minelab recently. I hope they work out your problem Jeff.

[Jeff McClendon]

12 minutes ago, schoolofhardNox said:

Even on the Manticore I have similar results. For a company that stressed how great the target ID was, it is not. Expanding the range made it worse. The E Trac had way better Target ID than any of the new models. I find the Manticore ups the target ID on copper cents when they are deep to 98 or 99. Way higher than they should be. I don't know if your 900 does that as well. I like the Manticore but it seems it is only good at certain sites. I want to say non EMI sites, but it has worked well on some of those too. Kind of hit or miss on if it's going to work or not. I bring it along but hardly ever pull it out to use. Getting a bit more than disappointed in Minelab recently. I hope they work out your problem Jeff.

Your post sounds familiar. 

These two bullet points from my review are specifically about clad dime and copper Memorial penny target ID instability.

- 4”+ deep flat laying clad dimes and copper pennies were triple beeping during left/right DD coil passes as if they were on the surface.

- Target IDs for those 24 high conductor coins were ranging from 68 to 98 during normal sweeps circling those coin targets whether they were 4” deep or 8” deep with very little possibility of telling the difference between a clad dime and copper Memorial penny.

[jasong]

Every time I get a hair away from pulling the trigger on a 900 or Manticore, I read something that makes go back to thinking I should just find a used 800 and wait for something better. Well keep up the reports, curious to hear if any planned or potential updates help, and if there is any compelling reason to use one of these newer machines for prospecting over an 800. I like new stuff, but not stuff that doesn't work well. 

[Jeff McClendon]

1 minute ago, jasong said:

Every time I get a hair away from pulling the trigger on a 900 or Manticore, I read something that makes go back to thinking I should just find a used 800 and wait for something better. Well keep up the reports, curious to hear if any planned or potential updates help, and if there is any compelling reason to use one of these newer machines for prospecting over an 800. I like new stuff, but not stuff that doesn't work well. 

As long as you just use an 800 or 900 for single tone Gold Mode gold prospecting where you dig it all.........no problem. Great prospecting VLFs.

[phrunt]

I'd just go the 800 myself in your case Jason, pick up a cheap one from someone "upgrading" to the 900 😛

You don't go diving, you look for gold and if you want ID accuracy for cherry picking the 800 is great.

I'm not at all surprised about your report Jeff, I've been saying the same about the Manticore ID's since I got one, a big disappointment there, especially seeing they advertise it as having better ID's, that's a blatant lie if you ask me.

I like everything about the Manticore, in fact love it, the ID's are it's let down, of course with messy ID's comes messy tones.

It's certainly a step backwards when it comes to ID's and for that reason alone I will still keep using my 800 for situations I need that accuracy.  The CTX is well and truly still king for ID.

 

[unox]

Very good write up Jeff, I have thought about selling my 800 for a 900 but have been reluctant to do so. I know they go deep and separate well, but so does the 800. Being a cherry picker those jumpy ID's would be useless to me in our manicured parks.

[Jeff McClendon]

Yeah, the 800 and 900 are both fine detectors. The 800 is still my all time favorite despite everything we now know about it. The 900 could be a worthy successor if it didn’t have such juvenile target IDs where I use it.

Thanks Simon and schoolofhardNox for giving your supporting information that I am not the only user noticing this. Like I said, I noticed it right off the first time I hunted with the 900 back in January. I thought it might be due to cold, frozen ground……Not!