Dubious

No longer :) But it does show they are being shipped. Probably won't be long before they are in stock everywhere.

Sometimes not clear whether it's a bug or a feature I haven't yet figured out. With pinpointing, I have run into a bug where the tone "sticks" at a fairly high level and won't go off (no matter where the coil is placed, even in air) until I exit and reenter the pinpoint mode.

I have been getting the impression that while the Nox offers single frequency use, it's in a somewhat rudimentary form and not really encouraged.

Yeah, well, here it's mostly the processing on the receiving end that matters. You would need to understand the hardware then yank the code from the firmware and run a dissembler, and then figure out what it all means. But even if you do all that, you're still not going to know any more about how to use the machine effectively. The devil in implementation is always in the details, and there's a big divide between theory and practice. What is going to help someone use the Nox effectively is simply using the machine (a lot of hours) and experimenting with different targets and conditions. The best guide to that is what's been posted by actual users, on this forum and others.

I have the Nox 600 and agree it is just as good as the Nox 800 for most things (those I am likely to do, anyway). I would like the 800's adjustable backlight, however. Sounds like you are willing to work that park all the way down to 25 cents/hour. Well, I guess I have worked for less, and not just at metal detecting...

Pulltabs, bottle caps, and rusty bent nails--now, if Minelab (or anyone else) could produce a detector that keeps those firmly in non-coin segments of the ID scale, I would certainly want that machine. Probably not entirely possible, alas, and maybe it's more fun this way... Minelab might be able to release firmware updates that were region-specific, to shift things somewhat to take into account local coinage; but I doubt it's going to do it. Personally, I think we should lobby our governments to go back to making coins of silver and copper, or, at least, to use single metals all the way through. It's disgusting how quickly clad coins degenerate in the ground due to the "battery" effect.

Remember, the perceived delay will depend on the swing speed. Quite noticeable with regular aptx for me. Gamers think they need LL, and I think detectorists will, too, once they've compared. But try for yourself.

Latency should not have anything to do with recovery speed setting--unless, of course, the Nox is doing something wonky and needs to be reset. It's simply the delay between when the Nox tries to transmit the encoded sound and your headphone speakers/drivers turn the signal back into sound. Aptx low latency represent a huge improvement for bluetooth, but far from being the best wireless scheme. Actually, for lowest latency, don't use wireless; use wires :)

I have the Garret Carrot, Detecknix and the Whites TRX. Of these, prefer the TRX. I hear good things about the new Fisher F-Pulse but haven't tried it.

Kind of like one of those proverbial balls of string. Anyone remember those?

I do not notice latency with LL headphones. However, I do notice it with regular aptx (not LL)--the sound sort of brackets the target on swings rather than being on top of the target. I'm doubtful anyone can really see the latency at <40ms, which is what it is supposed to be with LL headphones. Now, there is always the possibility that latency is much greater than 40ms, because of some process in either the headphones or the Nox getting snarled up and inserting a delay that should not be there. If you notice latency with LL, I would power down both the headphones and the Nox and restart, to see if it goes away.

From time to time, when I'm in pinpoint mode it will get "stuck" with the tone on constant high no matter where you move the coil. Going back to search/discr. mode then back to pinpoint mode has always gotten it working again. Also, sometimes when pinpointing the volume will suddenly drop down to almost nothing even though pinpointing is still working. Starting over gets volume back to normal. Neither of these bugs happen often enough to be a real problem.

Miccus or Avantree? I'm getting along fine with the Avantree Audition Pro--just came back from using them again. I also use the Sennheiser CX 6.00 earbuds when I don't feel like over the ear headphones. They also work well for me.

Unless someone goes to the trouble to reverse engineer the hardware and software--and explains it all--we'll never know the details. But it shouldn't matter at all in terms of using the Nox effectively. What Minelab says about the modes and the weighting given the frequencies is a good starting point; and beyond that it's experimentation all the way down :) Already a lot of good user experiences with modes and settings in different conditions posted.

Avantree Audition Pro (the "Pro" is the LL version, important). $69. Headset and Earcups are large and comfortable, at least for me.

I have the 600; and, while I would have paid more for the 800 had it been available at the time, I'm not sure I will get the 800 once it does hit the shelves. Sure I would like the additional tone and swing adjustments, but I just don't feel I have run into anything for which the 800 would have made a difference. For now, my one gripe is that the 600's backlighting is way too bright, but that can be addressed with a piece of red film.

I like the Sennheiser CX 6.00 low latency aptx earbuds, $99 on amazon. Whatever you get, I would recommend the low latency version of aptx, not regular aptx. Some don't seem to notice it, but at least for me, the difference in lag is noticeable.

Amazing finds! Yeah, hardly fair. Around here, I am happy finding a hundred-year old penny...

His V3i was probably correct about the iron; your Nox, with its faster circuitry and better separation, was just able to unmask the nearby coin. That's been my experience with the Etrac and Nox, anyway. A coin reasonably alone in the ground? Etrac all the way--better ID and depth info. But start giving the coin some ferous company and you reach a point at which the Etrac doesn't see it at all and the Nox still can.

The fact that Deus users are even seriously asking that question is a real recommendation for the Nox, given how much more the Deus and its (expensive) coils cost.

I read Tom's report, and my reaction is: I want that Explorer! Seriously, though, his experience isn't that different from mine; just comes at it from the other direction. We're both after coins, not relics; but where I've tested the Equinox the most are a few very iron-filled sites (old rusty nails and other junk) that I'd pretty much given up on with my Etrac. There, the Equinox, with its stock coil, separates and "sees" things the Etrac can't, plain and simple. In a park setting, I do prefer the Etrac, for its more accurate FE/CO and depth numbers. However, the Equinox seemed at least as deep there. (Some have said the Explorer II is deeper than the Etrac--I don't know.) Anyway, if I were him, I would keep the Equinox. It will complement that Explorer in many situations, I think. I would like to see how the Equinox does against the Kruzer. That's the kind of fast, modern, mid-priced machine the Equinox was designed to compete against, not Minelab's own high-end FBS machines.

My experience has been similar--depth often very unreliable, and readings approaching 40 so far large iron. The two silver Mercuries I found so far--both in good shape--were bouncing in mid-20s about where you'd expect. But, one I almost didn't dig as there was some iron grunting in a way that almost convinced me the machine was falsing on a nail. This dime was also in the middle of the plug only several inches down even though the meter was almost pegged. Apparently, other things there doing funny things to the machine; but I didn't dig further once I found the silver and verified no further high conductors in the hole. I now dig less big iron, I think, but still get fooled at lot by bent, rusty nails.

The fact that early adopters of the Equinox are even debating ML's statement--really just an advertising slogan--that it renders single-frequency machines obsolete shows that the Equinox has so far been very well received. Assuming ML comes out with some reasonably-priced coils, it should provide stiff competition to other new general-purpose mid-priced machines including the Impact and multi Kruzer. I'm reasonably sure the Equinox tells us something about the next generation of the ET/CTX line. But I doubt we'll see movement in the other direction; that is, ML probably doesn't plan to introduce a low-cost Multi-IQ machine to compete against the vast array of single-frequency detectors further down the price line, so that's probably where things will stop for now.

How soon can we expect Detech, Nel and others to come out with coils for the Equinox?

Well, you're doing just fine, with whichever machine.