Cal_Cobra

I got all that as well, they even said my item has shipped, The hen late yesterday I get another email from them that said it was back ordered until March 31 - what a joke!

As Steve pointed out, if another company one up'd minelabs technology, say a company that consistently listens to their customers, regularly communicates with them, and has excellent customer service, many would jump ship. There may be one such company with the ability that pull it off.

Thanks for the report. I may have missed it, but what search mode/settings were you using? I'm very curious to see how it runs in the gold prospecting mode for relic hunting, I'm thinking it might be killer in mineralized nasty soil with nails and iron. HH, Brian

Thank you for your order for EQUINOX 800 METAL DETECTOR. The vendor has advised us that the item is currently out of stock and has been backordered. They are expecting to ship approximately the end of March. We apologize for any inconvenience this may have caused & thank you for your patience. I've been buying electronics since I was a kid, I have never in my life seen such a cluster muck as this.

Thanks Steve for posting this! Are they downloadable to listen to while traveling?

I once dug an Asian 24K gold mens signet ring that read right at zinc penny on my F75 LTD, and the only reason I dug it was because I was at an old site and thought it might be an IHP. It was a pleasant surprise

That makes sense Steve. I never thought it was anything cynical, but it certainly created an interesting situation, and for those that pre-ordered in September, cast a shadow of doubt on ML, but I suspect you're right, it's likely a benign contractual obligation.

That's a nice hot rock all right

I wouldn't buy another detector that DID NOT have adjustable iron audio. I was first introduced to it on my Racer 2, and there's no doubt it's a valuable tool, particularly for those of us that relic hunt iron infested environs. HH, Cal

Wondering if you had the same idea I did....I still plan to honor my dealer order....and someone will likely get a great deal on a "slightly used" EQ800 in the "Bargain Cave"....just sayin'......shame that ML takes care of their regular dealers the way we've observed, not to mention those of us that had pre-orders in with our dealers since September.

I pulled the trigger on an EQ800 yesterday AM when they showed up, and the status now shows as shipped. Not sure how much time I'll have to play around with it for a while BUT the nice thing is Cabela's has a 90 day return policy (even includes a postpaid return shipping label) so you get 90 days to bond with it. AFAIK that's something no dealer on the planet offers.

Nice job JP, that's the kind of vids I'd enjoy seeing until I get mine! Are you in San Diego? I'm in NorCal, so am looking forward to hitting HMB, Santa Cruz, etc., to see how it does. This winter has sucked for beach erosion though

Follow along as I hunt the Spanish Trail and find OLD SILVER, a RARE BUTTON, interesting relics and more using the new Makro Multi Kruzer !!

There are still a few, very few, metal detecting manufactures that form a good relationship with their customers, definitely not what I'm seeing from Minelab.

I've found that the 5kHz frequency on both the Nokta Impact and Makro multi Kruzer is unusable at 8 out of 10 sites that I detect. 5 kHz seems to be a very noise susceptible frequency.

Certainly wouldn't kill them, and it would likely stop a lot of animosity on the forums.

Kind of about the way I feel. The Makro Multi is already shipping, they've landed in Europe and should land this upcoming week in North America.

Look at this, Carl calling me to the carpet Kidding, and actually Carl I'm pleased that you asked. First I know you've only been there a short while (well according to Linkedin, 3 yrs 10mos), so their current state of affairs isn't your doing. That said, for starters a less ambiguous statement then "huge game changer" that carries zero substance without context. As Steve H. pointed out, that's the same blurb that's been used for the past 5 years or so. Sharing anything about future plans would be 100% more the what FTP has shared with us in the past. I have no doubt that FTP is working on something, nobody invests money to build a new state of the art facility for not. We just witnessed a "huge game changer" release, and Minelab wasn't making claims four years ago that their deathstar was almost operational. Nobodies asking FTP to release their source code, secret sauce, or any proprietary information, but the silence has been deafening. How about product road map? It doesn't have to be a five or ten year road map, start with something within grasp, like two. Again, something is better then nothing, which is exactly what's been delivered basically since the F75 was released (not counting all the mid to lower end machines that've effectively been derivatives of other models). No offense, but IMO saying "One is that it gives competitors a heads-up and allows them to react quicker, maybe even preempt our efforts." that's a cop-out. I've been working in Silicon Valley as an engineer for the past 20 years, and been involved in many large product projects from inception to release (think six digit data center & core switches), and all of the projects have one thing in common....customers. Nobody is releasing the PRD's and functional specs to the customers, but sharing a basic road map is a good place to start. I hate to see the American detector industry following suite of the American auto industry, and although I doubt FTP will be on Capitol Hill with their hand out any time soon, as I'm sure they sell plenty of machines to afford that shiny new facility, yet you can only sell a K Car for so long, at some point, people are looking to you for a Viper , but instead we get minivans. Carl I realize your not the CEO of FTP, but right now, simply put, the overseas vendors are running circles around FTP. OK, we now return to your regularly scheduled programming

Smoke and mirrors.....what would be a huge game changer is if First Texas was a bit more forthcoming and transparent with their customers. I was a FT fanboy for years, the CZ series was great in their day, the F75 family was pretty good, but going on 20 years and 10 years old, respectively, their long in the tooth now, and there are far better machines these days. I hope FTP all the best, but I stopped holding my breath and listening to the rumor mill claiming they were on the verge of releasing a game changer years ago. IMHO with machines like the Makro Racers, Makro Multi Kruzer, Nokta Impact, XP Dues, and the Minelab Equinox, First Texas has a LOT of catching up to do, so it best be an epically ginormous game changer at that

Have had one for about three years now......sadly it's been sitting in the closet collecting dust for the past two years while I use my better performing detectors that actually are new.

Gerry thanks for taking the time to write that (lengthy) post. I don't disagree with most of what you said EXCEPT that considering these machines are in fact user upgradable, I fail to see the issue if they'd shipped them earlier, continued working their upgrades, and then provided a software upgrade. As a matter of fact, I think they'd been seen in a far better light then the "mum's the word" approach they took because: People would've received their detectors earlier, and that would've placated much of the negativity on the forums. Minelab's track record for detector firmware upgrades is poor at best, providing an upgrade with the features that held up the machines would've been seen as an impressive step in (a) listening to their customers and (b) demonstrating that they actually have their upgrade act together by providing value added software upgrades, thus providing an incrementally better product. In this fast moving modern world of advanced software and hardware products, people are used to software upgrades, else we'd all still be running iOS 3, Android Cupcake, oh and lest not forget Windows ME.

Thanks Steve. I'm sure once the kiddo gets old enough, we'll have a new detectorist in the family too (maybe the Equinox will be out by then...sorry, couldn't resist

I'm thinking about canceling my pre-order. My dealer let me know that he was receiving a whopping TWO units, and that I'm #8 on the list, and likely will not see it for some time. Not anybodies fault really, but I'm starting a new job next month, and it'll be an exceedingly time consuming job for the foreseeable future, and my wife and I are expecting our first this summer, so that likely will put my detecting on the back-burner until fall. By then, hopefully, the Equinox will no longer be a unicorn. Until we started observing that the receive date was such a moving target, I had really anticipated receiving it by some time in January, or at least February, certainly not in March or April, although as the pieces of the puzzle started to land into place, that picture was becoming more in focus. Hope it works for everyone as much as we are anticipating it will.

Took a field trip to field test the new Makro Multi Kruzer on the Spanish Trail: I tested the 2-TONE, 3-TONE and 4-TONE search modes exclusively. Out of these three modes, the 4-TONE is hands down the hottest, with 2-TONE and 3-TONE about tied. 4-TONE is extra sparky, and does it LOVE silver! I mentioned this in another post, but I did previously run into EMI issues on a consistent basis at one of these sites when I had my F75 LTD, and even after upgrading to the F75 LTD2, EMI was pretty noticeable, but tolerable. I was running the extra sparky 4-TONE mode on the Multi Kruzer, and it ran flawlessly, not even a hint of EMI (except when you set the machine down to dig). 3-TONE mode handles EMI better then 4-TONE, but 4-TONE is more powerful and hence, more susceptible to EMI. I had a great time, and I'm amazed at what was found from our "hunted out" sites. The Multi Kruzer in 19kHz 4-TONE mode is a confidence builder in that you do not feel you are not leaving targets behind, unlike I've experienced with some other detectors. Funny story - The site I dug the seated dime you'll see in the video isn't really a big secret, a couple dozen period coins (British gold coin, reales, seateds, IHP's, etc.) have been recovered at it. It's getting tough, the last time I was there prior to this trip, I didn't get any period coins. It has sea of nail environs, with myriads of shotgun, riffle and small arms shells to weed through. Just a few days before I went on my trip, Tom got a call from one of his detecting acquaintances that he saw the site and asked if he knew anything about it. Ended up that he and another guy detected it with a CTX and a Dues XP and got no coins. I went in and hunted right behind them (I could see their dig holes, as unfortunately they didn't even bother to fill them in) and managed to pull out a nice seated dime. The icing on the cake was that the dime was only a couple of feet from one of their dig holes Spanish Trail Multi Kruzer Road Trip Wrap-Up Video This is the same site I tested the Makro Racer 2 when it was first publicly released: HH, Cal

Agreed, just curious about the start of the clock of said 6-week delay.....