Cal_Cobra

On 1/22/2018 at 9:05 AM, Steve Herschbach said:

Nails are not much problem for me. I hate flat tin type steel - old rusted cans, flattened cans, round ends of cans, can fragments, parts of old steel roofing, etc. Some of that stuff sounds great on most any detector. BBS does well on rejecting it and FBS also to a lesser extent but at the cost of serious masking. Equinox opens it back up as far as the masking goes but then flat steel becomes more an issue again. There is quite the balancing act trying to reject ferrous while not masking everything. I wish I could say Equinox magically shuts it all up while masking nothing, but I don’t think that’s possible. It’s still a balancing act.

Oh yes that dang flat steel / tin that they used for roofing, siding, you name it, is a major PITA.  Actually I don't mind nails either, a good iron sifting machine will pick the goods out, just have to be plugged into detecting that environment and have a good machine for that. 

Steve it seems like your saying that the Equinox doesn't have any advantage with that pesky flat iron/tin that's littered in a lot of these old ghost town sites, but how would you say it compares in these environs compared to something like a Racer2 or Impact?   I'll take any advantage I can get for these kind of sites.

46 minutes ago, Steve Herschbach said:

vfp7 is basically repeating what Monte says in his Setup Sheet for the Nail Board Test. If anyone does not do it exactly as described it would invalidate the test.

Here is my version of the test, includes hot rocks, flat steel, etc....

That right hand side looks about like what I typically am detecting in ghost towns, stage stops, adobe sites, etc., lots of small (and large sometimes) iron to contend with.  Right now my go to iron sifter is the Makro Racer2 or Nokta Impact, both excel at picking the goods out of iron infested sites. 

Luckily I've never really had to deal much with hot rocks, but I suppose that could change if I start doing some prospecting with the EQ800?

4 hours ago, Cabin Fever said:

MichiganRelicHunter posted a link to this test video on Tom’s site yesterday.. Definitely an eye opener that shows how the nail board test is of limited value for evaluating a detector.

I don't think it's a limited value test, it's just one test, one data set that tells a story, but it's only one chapter of the story.   Like troubleshooting or testing most anything, one test doesn't suffice, BUT I will say that for a serious relic hunter you wouldn't want a detector that does poorly on the NBT. 

Some detecting manufacturers have adopted the NBT as one of the hundreds of tests they perform to build/test/tune their machines. 

Good stuff Ray!  This is in your area?  Never have detected in gold country yet.... one of these days, lot of interesting relics and you can't beat gold rush era coins 

HH,
Brian

That doesn't look too bad compared to the abysmal beach detecting I did today while testing a "new" detector.    Our beaches are sanded in, had hoped the storm activity would've erroded the beach, but it wasn't in the cards this time.

HH,
Brian

19 hours ago, Sinclair said:

Well - you can use your favorite existing headphones with the benefit of having no wire running to the detector...

I really like that feature!

I suppose, although now you no longer have a wireless solution.  

Since I went wireless on my Racer2 and Impact, I never want to go back to corded headphones.

I know we all want to see for ourselves, but so far, everyone that's tested them has said they're A-OK with zero lag  

I'd been OK if they knocked another $50 off the 800  and left the WM08 module as an option, although truth be told, it probably costs them all of $5 to build it 

It already comes with BT AptX headphones, and from all accounts they work very well.  To be honest, I'm not sure why they provide the wireless module on the E800.

Without getting to technical, it's basically a Bluetooth wireless audio codec that's faster at signal transmission then it's predecessors.   This is because the legacy technology had lag, which is undesirable for realtime audio/visual applications. 

I think that's awesome they got the multi mode to work on the prospecting mode.  I had questioned that in the past, and low and behold they did it!   That alone actually has me pretty excited, if they did a 20kHz/40khz simultaneous multi-frequency mode (which is somewhat implied) it is probably killer at the beach, killer for relic hunting, and I would expect, and believe we've actually seen proven on another thread,  killer for nugget hunters too   

By far the best Equinox Treasure Talk article yet!  I think now we know why Steve was being tight lipped on the prospecting mode, although I believe he did allude to it going through some "further testing" phase 

Also nice to see they pulled back the curtain a bit on how the various modes are setup, and kudos to ML for multiple setups in each mode 

Don't believe everything you read....especially on the Internet

With as much time as I spend detecting in the Nevada desert, I need to educate myself on meteorites.  Admittedly if I saw that lying on the ground, I'd pass right by it without a second thought, hmmm.....

I have not found 5kHz to be my go to frequency selection on my Impact, matter of fact it's super susceptible to EMI, and my least used frequency.  For my challenging relic hunting sites I've found 20kHz to be where it's at, but multi-freq will be a game changer IMO. 

On 1/3/2018 at 7:44 AM, FlyFish said:

STM32F103VBH6 STMicroelectronics ARM Microcontrollers - MCU 32BIT Cortex M3 128K 20KB RAM 

 

I'm actually a bit surprised that the EQX is running a low end off the shelf general purpose 32BIT Cortex M3 CPU.

ARM® Cortex® -M3 32-bit RISC core operating at a 72 MHz frequency, high-speed embedded memories (Flash memory up to 128 Kbytes and SRAM up to 20 Kbytes), and an extensive range of enhanced I/Os and peripherals connected to two APB buses. All devices offer two 12-bit ADCs, three general purpose 16-bit timers plus one PWM timer, as well as standard and advanced communication interfaces: up to two I2Cs and SPIs, three USARTs, an USB and a CAN.

These features make the STM32F103xx medium-density performance line microcontroller family suitable for a wide range of applications such as motor drives, application control, medical and handheld equipment, PC and gaming peripherals, GPS platforms, industrial applications, PLCs, inverters, printers, scanners, alarm systems, video intercoms, and HVACs.


I guess if the EQX sucks, we can always load Android on it

4 hours ago, Chase Goldman said:

Good for gold nugget prospecting.  This mode operates high single frequencies of 20 or 40 kHz, optimum for gold nuggets.

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This is the one feature on the 800 that seems a bit counter intuitive, because if it obsoletes VLF machines, why is it utilizing VLF single freq technology for the prospecting mode vs multi? 

I wonder if ML tried testing simultaneous multi-frequency for the prospecting mode, perhaps leveraging 20kHz & 40kHz and couldn't get it to work as expected?  

8 hours ago, Steve Herschbach said:

It is easy to get into this Minelab versus that Minelab, but all Minelab cares about is Minelab versus the competition. Compare the Equinox 600 at $649 to the Garrett AT Max at $722 and the real picture becomes clearer.

Clearly a no-brainer 

I put all of my detecting clad, and pocket change into a glass container, and every Memorial Day weekend I cash it in donate it at the Tonopah Station 

7 hours ago, Steve Herschbach said:

It turns out to be hard to get a photo showing the difference because my smart camera keeps auto adjusting the light for me! So here goes but note the background lighting changing in each picture so this is only a fairly good representation of what I am seeing in person. The Equinox 800 has four settings (Off, Low, Med, High) and the Equinox 600 has two (On, Off). Click for larger image...

 

Nice, that should work fine, might need my patented red anti-glare screen protector though :)

I'd love to get in on the factory training, maybe time to sign up to be a Minelab dealer 

I like the screen protector!   I've always disliked that the F75 backlight wasn't adjustable, heck you couldn't even disable it.  A dealer in Germany was adding an on/off switch for a nominal fee.  How's the Equinox backlight?  I like that the 800 has different backlight levels, this was implemented very well on the Mak/Nok machines I've used.  

On 11/20/2017 at 4:14 PM, Steve Herschbach said:

I have the 800 on pre-order, and was thinking the 600 would be a great backup machine for the 800    Same coils, can use the wireless headphones that come with the 800 on a 600, same coils, etc.  

Many people have requested the ability to split the ferrous into two zones. That can be done easily on the Equinox 800 by going to Five Tone mode. Assign two segments to the ferrous region as you wish, and distribute the remaining three non-ferrous segments. You would have only three tones non-ferrous but in return you would have the ferrous split into small ferrous and large ferrous. This is something relic hunters will appreciate.

I'm not sure if I'd like this or not, but I will absolutely give it a try.  

Look ma, no wires

Not a lot I can add, aside from I like the idea of a lightweight, waterproof, fast, simultaneous multi-frequency machine that also has the ability to use individually selectable frequencies.  I suspect it could open up some of my existing sites, and push me to try new things like prospecting without having to buy a single purpose detector.   I also enjoy testing new things.  

So if your finding these small nuggets in [multi] & field mode, heck the Equinox 600 would be just as capable in this regard, as according to the ML specs, the 600 & 800 utilize identical frequencies in simultaneous multi-frequency modes.  

Hmm....

2 hours ago, Steve Herschbach said:

I suggest not wasting time and just head for that great silver location that is not producing anymore and go detecting. Most likely the closest old city or town park. Or head to the beach. Whatever. Should not take more than a session or two to sort things out in most people’s minds. 

Steve if you'd kindly lend me your 800 for a weekend, I'd be ecstatic to hit the local old San Francisco parks and the beach too, I'll gladly leave you my Impact as collateral  

J/K - Definitely looking forward to putting it through the initial paces to see what it's capable of.  I have several sites that are challenging for various reasons (ground conditions, iron, etc) and others that seem to be hunted out, but I suspect still have treasure to give up, it just takes a machine that does things differently.