Steve Herschbach

I can offer one insight on dedicated versus multipurpose. It is extremely important to understand that what helps one detectorist may hurt another when you design a detector. For instance, making a detector very hot on gold nuggets can also make it not work at all in saltwater. Making it work in saltwater makes it weak on gold nuggets. Fast recovery means better target separation, slow recovery more depth. Etc. In theory it is a matter of more frequencies and more adjustments, but that also can get in the way of a person who only cares about one task. And hardware can be either general purpose or task specific. If you decide to build a prospecting detector, all feedback and changes are made for one thing only - to make a unit great for prospecting. Even then competing desires require compromises to be made. Now try making a detector that satisfies field hunters in the U.K., park hunters in the U.S., and beach hunters everywhere. Toss prospecting in to complete the kitchen sink. Imagine the demands made and compromises that occur. That is why Equinox will be a great all rounder, perhaps the best ever made, but expecting it to somehow be better than a collection of separate dedicated units is a hard ask. And that in a nutshell is why detectors like the Excalibur and Gold Monster will continue to exist, and why prospectors in particular will not be ditching their dedicated units in favor of generalized units. Gold prospecting is one of the most technically demanding types of metal detecting and what makes a detector great for gold prospecting often makes it unsuitable for most other uses.

No apology required Chase. Try being on the inside trying to relay accurate information while not getting tripped up by final tweaks and tuning. That is why I keep saying over and over again to people certain things have to wait for final shipping versions to appear. Anything else is premature at best and misleading at worst. It’s a fine line to tread. No doubt Mark Lawrie was employing the latest firmware versions and observing dealer responses and feedback which could result in another tweak. He would be an idiot not to take advantage of such a situation and Mark is no idiot - far from it.

If you are caught by an enforcement officer in Alaska they may just warn you or throw the book at you. I have been told directly by enforcement people in Alaska that hands and pans means that and so much as feeding your pan with a spoon is a violation. It’s easier to find places in Alaska where no such rules apply and far less stressful than wondering if your activities are being filmed for legal action.

For nearly everyone coil diameter is a measurement of physical size, nothing more. Internal windings are a different issue. How does this rationale work with DD coils? Figure 8 windings? Stacked co-axial? Whatever, the 5.3 is what it is and people sure do seem to love it or hate it.

Great post Cipher. Feel free to provide links when doing this sort of thing - saves people from having to do scavenger hunts via a Google.

Mineralized ground is not the same thing as coal waste so I will be surprised if Equinox does not struggle in that stuff just like all the others.

Correct, price is one of the ways CTX is not faring well versus less expensive competition, though if the CTX was the same price it still would lose lots of sales to Deus in particular, for reasons you mention and more - like recovery speed in trash. The bottom line is CTX is expensive and heavy and so a new platform had to be developed to compete with the hot sellers from Garrett and XP. The only point I am trying to make is Equinox is designed to compete with the Garrett AT series and XP Deus and will succeed or fail based on how it does versus those detectors. If people want to buy an Excalibur or E-TRAC or CTX instead Minelab certainly won’t be upset.

Wow, I guess I still get surprised now and then. Minelab has yet to learn that the time to sell accessories is when a customer has the credit card out and is buying the detector. Time to talk accessories. Now, no coil prices, no ETA - that is going to cost them and dealers lots of accessory sales. Many people will get the detector and after the excitement dies down, decide the stock coil is good enough.

Gold Mode started out with 20 and 40 kHz options. MF was added and made the default. To me that was one change but if you want to make it two that’s fine

Here is what Gordon Heritage, one of the testers, has to say about iron bias. It agrees with my understanding of the control. He posts as ironhearted_gog on the Minelab Owners Forum. The control is quite subtle from what I have seen so far - not some magic weapon. Turning it all the way up does not eliminate flat tin steel, hardened steel bolts, or other problematic items that trouble VLF detectors.

Thanks for the report Lunk. Same old story - hard to beat dedicated gold prospecting detectors designed for a single function with machines designed to achieve many functions. The Gold Monster excels on tiny gold and is still my first choice for that particular task. The pure simplicity of the thing makes it a better tool for a person who only cares about small gold nuggets, nothing else. Chase, Gold Mode started as having only the 20 kHz and 40 kHz options. That was reported on before you became a member here. Then MF was added as an option. Minelab has previously stated machines will ship by end of January. Some people interpreted that to mean detectors would be in hand before end of January, but the reality is nothing has changed as regards announced delivery times.

The number of transmitted frequencies is a marketing thing. All that matters is frequencies received and processed. Even more important is how the frequencies are processed.

For those who are not sure what the discussion is about, version 4.1 adds a new function - Ground Sensitivity. Page 35 of the new 4.1 Owner's Manual:

Most raw nugget gold is far purer than jewelry gold. 14K gold is 58% gold, the rest usually silver. Most nugget gold I find runs from 80% to 95% gold, the remainder mostly silver.

Hi dew, The addition of multifrequency to the Gold Mode did nothing to change the underlying fundamentals of Multi-IQ. The statement is a generality, nothing more, that attempts to describe the difference between BBS/FBS and Multi-IQ in simplistic terms. The Equinox was designed to compete with the Garrett AT detectors and XP DEUS more than anything else. If that was not already obvious the leaked dealer meeting photo should make it so! That is the bar Minelab set for themselves. That is also an admission that the CTX is lacking in the ways needed to compete with those detectors, which are outselling it by huge numbers. Addressing that is what Equinox is all about, not replacing the Excalibur or CTX 3030.

I have added part 3 of the Multi-IQ series to my ongoing compilation Minelab Multi-IQ Technology Explained

Mike, the Gold Mode features full on screen target id capability plus target masking. I actually mentioned this already in another post but wanted to make sure I was not getting ahead of myself. Looks like instead of erasing my previous hint I am ok to proceed at least this far. Chase, the modes have disc presets but I can’t get into details quite yet. The bottom line is they are just starting points anyway that generally focus on preset ferrous rejection. The detectors are made for use worldwide, so putting a pattern in Park Mode 1 that was preset for U.S. coins (for instance) would just irritate users elsewhere.

Comparisons are welcome but best posted on the Metal Detector Advice & Comparisons Forum as they will just get moved there anyway. This is a White's forum for White's owners so talk of other brands should be kept minimal or incidental.

The E600 and E800 have identical wireless capability - the only difference in that regard is the packaged accessories. Click for larger version....

Guys, honestly, as a webmaster this is simple. Cabelas online store is designed to either sell product on hand, or show items as being on backorder status. It is not designed to presell unavailable items. Somebody listed the items as being in stock, creating a problem. So they pulled it off for now to avoid creating a can of worms with people expecting quick delivery. You guys do know I have inside information on availability, right? Or am I just wasting my time repeating over and over that the ONLY information that you should pay attention to regarding availability is that issued directly by Minelab? I can assure you I want these things to ship as much or more than anyone, and would not let such an event pass without comment. Until then.....

Detect Speed (Recovery Speed or Reactivity) ranges from 1 to 3 on the Equinox 600 and 1 to 8 on the Equinox 800. Here are how the Detect Speed settings map one against the other: 600 800 - 1 1 2 - 3 2 4 - 5 3 6 - 7 - 8 All lack of function or adjustments on the Equinox 600 is intentional to create a simpler to operate, less expensive alternative to the Equinox 800. The settings on the 600 could be described as the most common likely settings. The additional range in settings as offered on the Equinox 800 are less likely to be used due to the extremity of the machine response at those levels, and as such they can be regarded as “Pro” settings.

A placer is a concentration of mineral that occurs after the original host rock has decomposed. Therefore a placer cannot by definition exist in fresh lava. If you are simply asking if gold could be found in a recently cooled fresh lava flow, the answer is that is extremely unlikely. Placer Geology

Apparently this caused enough problems for Cabela’s that they have pulled the ability to order online for now. Or they already sold everything they had coming on the initial order.

TheHunterGT Published on Dec 29, 2017

TheHunterGT Published on Jan 12, 2018