Steve Herschbach

Answered here http://www.detectorprospector.com/forum/topic/5305-important-tip-global-vs-local-settings/?do=findComment&comment=55816

Honestly, I think you may be overthinking things. The fact is some situations like rapidly variable ground, call more for ground tracking. Prospectors run into this often, so tracking is the preset default. In parks ground is often more homogenous, and manual usually works fine. So it was made a default. You could also argue tracking was the better choice for a default with some merit. My personal perspective is that defaults are meaningless to me and I do not read anything into default settings other than what I have already stated. So if you want to try and read the tea leaves and divine meanings that is fine, but I can’t help with it myself. There is no one correct default setting and in the end you have to pick something, so it ends up being a choice by committee. There is nothing wrong with running a detector in a park with a preset ground balance point if you are a beginner. Many detectors work no other way. And many detectors that can be adjusted never are. How many Deus users ever employ anything other than a factory preset manual ground balance setting of 90? Probably not as many as never touch it and do just fine. A lot of mild ground is very forgiving and requires nothing else. I was asked about my suggestions for defaults at one point and my basic response to Minelab was “I don’t care because I will change them anyway”. The defaults I would choose are what works for me, and that would probably make the machine a hot mess for others. In general with defaults you hand the detector to a complete novice, they choose a default mode, and the detector works. It will probably not be optimum but it will perform well without going off the rails.

Depends who you ask. That is the thing about defaults - they work for some people and not for others. The rationale is simple - the thought was that it is a good starting point for most people, to be changed by those who think differently. Defaults are relatively safe starting points for beginners, nothing more. Safe being the main goal, not best performance. That would be like putting your young daughter in a car for the very first time with the gas peddle glued to the floor. A wreck waiting to happen!

It appears to be petrified wood. A lot of petrified wood in Alaska is jet black inside but weathers to a beautiful tan wood like appearance on the outside and it just looks like wood. This one has the right appearance but it is very hard to identify things via pictures on the internet. If you have access to a rock saw, slicing an end off might reveal the actual grain/rings in the wood, which is a dead giveaway. Rock layers tend to be flat, but petrified wood has rings just like in a cut log.

It almost has an amber look to it but the green is totally throwing me. I vote for glass slag but it is extremely hard to id pictures of rocks. Neat find whatever it is.

No worries Jim The main thing right now is just about everyone put something new out the last few months. So with First Texas we still have the “new machines over next four years” thing going on. Maybe a beach PI by the end of 2018 or in 2019? Garrett just released the AT Max. I kind of gave up on a light dry land Garrett ATX but maybe someday? Minelab I think we have some idea about whats up there. Makro we have the new Kruzer series just being launched. Nokta has been working on a PI for a couple years. Maybe this year after the Kruzer release is completed? Tesoro? Naw... White’s? All we can do is hope. XP? Maybe a lower cost model based on the DPR 600? There is not much really on the horizon once Equinox and a Kruzer hit the streets. I would personally be interested in whatever PI First Texas and Nokta have in the works, but other than that I am not really expecting much else. I guess if I had to root for anyone at this point it would be White’s getting the long awaited “new tech” to market that has been in the works for years, just because I think they really need a break soon. The crossfire between Garrett, First Texas, Minelab, and Nok/Mak is getting pretty intense. First Texas may not have any radically new machines out for some time, but the aggressive price reductions are keeping them in the game. All just guesswork. Sorry I don’t mention any other manufacturers but I really don’t pay attention myself to other ones. If anyone wants to add a guess about the Euro folks, that’s fine. and just a last note.... this thread will probably move to the advice and comparisons forum after it runs the course here.

It is impossible to blame people for being anxious so please go easy on people just looking for the latest info. It is hard to tell what is real or not out of all the stuff being posted. Generally however if it is not a new update direct from Minelab I pretty much ignore it all.

Yes. Lots of rumors floating around. I have not heard of any extra delay but it is not like I get told everything.

Well, sort of...

Here is the critical part Mike....

Welcome to the forum Fred. I will create a pinned thread up top to replace the two that are there now with links to the main informational threads. Good idea - thanks.

Nothing much beyond what I posted above. To me presets don't mean much. The preset for Gold Mode is ground tracking, and generally the first thing I am going to do is go to manual, ground balance slightly positive, and get too it. The thing about Equinox is that it is dangerous to assume old ways apply... my GPZ 7000 for instance almost never leaves auto ground track mode. Ground tracking to me is more an efficiency thing for variable ground, but when the ground is relatively homogenous I personally still prefer manual. I have used ground tracking while park hunting a couple times, and it seemed to work just fine. It's something I will have to build confidence in over time as to when and when not to apply it.

Yeah, I reported back on it on that thread. 800ma will not quite trigger charging. The charging light flashes in a weak fashion but nothing is happening. I am guessing the cutoff is around 1.0 amp? A power pack made up of 8 AA batteries would no doubt do the trick. Since I charge every night and have never had a problem however I am not pursuing that aspect much anymore. It was an interesting experiment but from a practical perspective not something I need personally worry about.

Wow Tim, thank you very much - very kind of you and others. I am just a big kid from Alaska. I want to play, have fun, go detecting, find stuff, yack about it, and have a good time. To me that is what detecting is all about. Most of my sharing the last couple decades was for me just payback to those who helped me when I got started, and the joy of sharing a passion with people of similar mind. I am however an intense introvert and so at a basic level people do puzzle me sometimes. I truly do not understand all the negativity that has come to envelop what is merely a hobby for most people. I have never done anything quite like the post that starts this thread, but it is nothing but the truth. I really love running the Equinox because it just clicks for me personally on many levels. The trolls of course will think I am declaring Equinox the best detector ever, and make it their goal to prove otherwise. They can't win that with me because I don't care what other machines do as regards Equinox, and if somebody shows a video of brand x beating Equinox at some particular task, I just don't care. I can only use one detector at a time, I really, really like this one, and it's the one I am going to use. I know I can make it perform the way I want and that is all that matters. Any minor issues that crop up and create some future forum firestorm - whatever. My focus will be strictly on how to get the best out of the machine, not dwelling on whatever it is that it can't do. I set this forum up early with the idea of trying to round up a bunch of really good people to hang out with and learn as we go about Equinox. You folks really are terrific, and have made this all a pleasure, so thank you. As alluded to before I have other business to attend to starting this weekend and so will be a rarer feature of the forum after that. I always will be here daily to help with what I can and to eject any trolls that sneak in, but I really am counting on machines getting into other people's hands and posts from them taking up the slack going forward. I certainly have more to say about Equinox and so I am not going away, but if people are looking for responses from me after this weekend the responses may be slower in coming. Thanks again for being such a great bunch of fun people!

I can now confirm that if you run the detector off an external power source, excess power will be used to charge the machine while running. If there is just enough power to run the machine, then charging will not occur simultaneous to running off the external source. No, I don’t know where that tipping point occurs in terms of charging amps. You read it right Sinclair - I am sorry if my “old and out of date knowledge” caused any confusion, but now we both know for sure.

OK, I may have been wrong. A question on another thread caused me to try charging/running while powered up and it appeared to be doing both at the same time. Here was my comment on the other thread... "Hmmm.... it is possible something has changed. Before it was quite clear that Equinox is either running off an external source, or charging off an external source, but not both at once. Now, if the detector is running and I connect an external source, the detector keeps running and it appears to be charging also if I can trust the charging light. I can connect while running and disconnect and the detector keeps running. It appears to automatically go to external power if available, and maybe also be using any excess to charge. It may be I used a lower amperage adapter before, and there may be a point where the amps gets low enough that it must choose - charge or run detector? More experimentation required. Everyone is super busy at Minelab for some reason right now so I am not bothering them with questions for the time being."

dew, those are just Factory Presets. If you want to use automatic tracking in beach mode you can. Here is a copy from another thread I posted: Automatic ground tracking largely keys off ground mineral response. Many white sand beaches in particular have such low mineral content tracking can go astray. Even ground grab methods can fail in extreme low mineral ground and you may have to use default values. This is not unique to Equinox, and if there is one area I would use extreme caution with tracking it would be very low mineral and/or saltwater situations. The salt range and gold overlap and tracking could possibly track into salt more aggressively than intended, blocking gold signals. I don’t have enough experience with Equinox in salt environments to say this is a fact; I am just saying this is one area where I would be very cautious of ground tracking.

Nobody including Minelab can predict how this will play out everywhere and in my opinion this is just CYA language. “may” “under certain circumstances” It is pretty easy to look at most competition product and make clear decisions. The most difficulty it seems with Equinox has been CTX owners wondering how they compare. I think it will be a very fine line between the two in the balance and I sure am not going to tell every CTX owner out there which way to go because I just don’t know. I only know that on my ground and for my uses CTX did not offer me enough reasons to keep it once I had an Equinox. Others are going to decide just the opposite. The Equinox from my perspective is a hot, sparky machine whereas the CTX by comparison is smooth and mild mannered. That difference alone may be what tips people one way or the other. I don’t see the CTX versus Equinox thing settling out until lots more CTX fans have a chance to use Equinox. Even then I doubt the answer will be clear cut. Both are going to have fans. For me though it’s Equinox all the way.

As far as I know Gold Monster is the last truly new single frequency detector we will see from Minelab. I am not counting the recent refresh of the Go-Find series. Multifrequency / advanced processing is the future now, and I have no doubt a Multi-IQ based nugget detector would excel across the board. For a VLF - you always have to include that caveat when talking gold prospecting.

Getting rid of a half dozen other detectors with related coils and accessories. Coming out way ahead in both money and space!

No, I wish I did but I do not. Right now accessory pricing is probably the most inportant unknown thing about Equinox that a lot of us would like to see put to bed.

I have no special knowledge on this but I would anticipate a trickle followed by a flood. My guess is Minelab had units prepositioned in the U.S. and elsewhere to get a few units out to everyone, but they were probably shipped air. The bulk is probably on the way by container ship and will arrive later. Basically at this point I think we are talking shipping/logistical stuff. Just guessing though but makes sense to me. Gerry, you should know by now - dealers are always the last to be told anything!

I have been using an Equinox for some time now, and a few of my early posts on the subject were received with skepticism because of my over the top enthusiasm. More time has passed, and with Equinox now getting ready to find its way into the hands of the general public I decided it’s time to reflect and recap. Everyone has their own idea of what constitutes the perfect detector. As someone who has been detecting for over 45 years now I certainly know what I want in a perfect detector. I like to partake in any type of detecting that exists, and so I want one detector that truly is as versatile as possible, with the least compromise possible. This is a complex and difficult task, because historically certain detecting tasks have been at odds with each other. In particular there has been a gap between detectors that are good at handling saltwater, yet which can also find tiny gold. In the past that meant I needed one detector to work in saltwater, and a different one for hunting micro jewelry on the dry beach or tiny gold nuggets in the goldfields. The Minelab Equinox is, for me, the best all around metal detector I have ever used. It is not any one thing in particular, though if I had to name one thing it would be Multi-IQ. It is the real magic of Equinox, and is the reason that when I use an Equinox I know I am holding onto one of the most powerful VLF detectors ever made. I think Minelab has created something that has surprised even them as to how good it is. In my case, despite what may seem over the top enthusiasm, the truth is I have been holding back. The Minelab Equinox is an extremely powerful VLF type detector, and I can’t think of anything I can’t do well with it. I would happily use a Equinox versus any other VLF machine and user anywhere in the world doing any type of detecting, and not worry I am being outgunned. Just the opposite in fact. That’s not to say the Equinox is perfect - nothing is. Yet for this jaded detectorist it is as close as I have ever seen for my purposes, and why I have pretty much abandoned using anything else at this point. Because for me, the Minelab Equinox is the best all around do everything detector I have ever used. I am honored to have been chosen to take part in this project and I want to thank Minelab both for that and for finally putting the detector in my hands that has only existed in my mind the last twenty years. 2018 really is poised to be the Year of the Equinox. Steve Herschbach DetectorProspector.com

I am quite anxious to get a large coil for the very same reasons. I have to clarify however. I really like the 11” round DD coil for almost all uses. My negative commentary regarding that coil has strictly to do with prospecting for tiny nuggets in rough terrain. But parks, beaches, in the water, etc. I like the coil. I count ground coverage as every bit as important as depth, maybe more so. That 12” x 15” coil will help a lot in that regard.

So far I have found the Equinox ground tracking to be very good, and I have not made up my mind yet what is the best way to go. As an old timer I tend to always default to manual because I know I am in control. Yet in variable ground this can be very tedious to keep up with, and if you do not keep on top of it being in manual is actually a bad idea. Minelab claims, and I think they make a good argument, that most people do not know well enough how to stay on top of manual ground balance, and so tracking is recommended for beginners especially. One of my last prospecting runs on really bad ground, I experimented with tracking both on hot rocks and small metal targets. Hot rocks would usually track out in just two sweeps. On the other hand, I saw no evidence of metal items tracking out, though I know when targets get extremely faint there is still risk of it. Bottom line is tracking looks real good. Automatic ground tracking largely keys off ground mineral response. Many white sand beaches in particular have such low mineral content tracking can go astray. Even ground grab methods can fail in extreme low mineral ground and you may have to use default values. This is not unique to Equinox, and if there is one area I would use extreme caution with tracking it would be very low mineral and/or saltwater situations. The salt range and gold overlap and tracking could possibly track into salt more aggressively then intended, blocking gold signals. I don’t have enough experience with Equinox in salt environments to say this is a fact; I am just saying this is one area where I would be very cautious of ground tracking.