Hi Chase,
Thanks for the advice & info. Totally understand a newbie can be unaware/unrealistic, over purchase & lose interest quickly. Also aware it's for fun & rarely pays for the beer money let alone equipment, fuel, effort etc.
After looking at the prices of a 7000, 5000, 2300 the Equinox is light relief. I've done quite a bit of research, been detecting with a newbie friend who purchased the 2300 first up. Talk about the blind leading the blind (now experts at cleaning up ferro trash). The joke being we could have opened up as scrap metal franchise.
I may consider it as an allrounder & entry level gold detector & if I get serious I could up grade to a specialist gold detector as required. As you say it will probably hold it's value for resale, though from reading about other people's equipment it would most likely complement rather than a replacement in one's arsenal.