mh9162013

You use a concentric with your Umax, right? Seems like there's two ways to hunt in heavy iron. One, there's using a machine with high recovery speed and great target separation and tring to surgically isolate the good signals amongst the bad. Two, there's using a concentric and letting the iron bits merge with the good targets. And even though the signal received by the Tesoro or other "older" machine might be an average signal of the high and low tone targets, if you set your discrimination knob in the right spot and have learned the nuanced sounds of your machine, then you can still reliabily identify when there's a good target amongst the iron trash.

Here's a response that's slightly more on point. I hade 2 Tesoros for a short while, but wasn't happy with their performance. The Vaquero's ground balancing seemed cumbersome and only when in All Metal Mode could it detect the clad dime and/or iron nail in my "test garden." But I do like Tesoros. I enjoy their light weight, retro-futuristic look (like Steampunk on steroids) and their "beep and dig" approach to hunting. I also liked their modification potential. And like the OP recognized, I think I could have learned how to use them better if I spent the time to learn the nuanced sounds my Tesoros made. My ears are odd. On the one hand, I'm tone deaf. If you played me just one of the 5 tones the Equinox makes in 5 tone mode, I probably could only identify the iron and second lowest tone reliably. But I'd get the mid, mid-high and high tones mixed up. When I'm hunting with my Equinox 600, I occassionaly confuse the mid-tone with the mid-high tone. And I almost always think the mid-high tone is actually the high tone. So VDIs are kind of important for me...😕 It's like in band class from years ago when I couldn't tell if my trumpet was playing a C or G. But on the other hand, I'm pretty good and recognizing patterns in certain voice and melodic cadences. This allows me to more easily identify voice actors or composers. We have yet to see if that "skill" can translate to metal detecting...

Very true. I believe that based on where and how I hunt, an AT Max and E-Trac can find 80-90% of what I would have found with my Equinox 600. But it's nice to have that extra edge you mentioned for the ocassional hunts that take me to somewhere different or going after targets that are in the super mineralized clay where I live.

Lucky me! 😃

Probably because as a percentage of total detectors sold, Tesoros are small (compred to Minelab, Garrett and Fisher). Being discontinued will have a psychological effect too, in that someone's less likely to sell something they aren't sure they could replace easily. This latter explanation is one of the strongest reasons as to why I'm consiering selling my Equinox 600 instead of my E-Trac; the fomer will be FAR easier (and likely cheaper) to replace in the future if I decide I made a mistake.

Not sure what your experience is working for a company, but people (especially managers) don't always act in their employer's best interest. And employees (regardless of where they are in the hierarchy) often don't get what they deserve for the good things they do, as well as the bad.

The bests interests of the company and end useres, yes. But the best interest of a particular manager? Maybe not.

You talking about the AT Pro? 😁 But seriously, I wonder why any company would develop a detector like that. I'm guessing poor management...

Neat teaser review! I'm definitely interested in that shaft. I have a possible Etrac coming my way though, so I'll have to make sure that doesn't work for me before I invest heavily in my Equinox. But assuming I do, I'll probably be getting one of Steve's shafts...

I don't really have an issue with that website. It might rub me the wrong way sometimes, but I don't think the owner of the site or most of its participants (ring finders) are unethical or anything.

"If you're really good at something, never do it for free" or so the saying goes, right? But it's one thing to give the impression that you're (the general you, not necessarily you in particular) volunteering to help, then charge a fee as opposed to giving the impression you're a business who has costs and expenses to cover. It's like food. No one complains that grocery stores charge for the food you buy there. But imagine going into a food bank expecting to get free food out of charity, only to be hit with a bill when trying to take the food to your car. For some reason, that website sometimes gives me the impression they're more of a food bank instead of a grocery store. I know my impression isn't necessarily correct, though.

My gut says the most we'll see from Minelab in 2022 in response to the Legend and Deus II is a software update and price increase. Maybe we'll get a teaser announcement in late 2022? I'm expecting MInelab to produce a new product that's better than the Equinox 800 (Equinox 1000, a next gen CTX, etc.), but I'm not expecting it to be released until 2023.

Great finds and glad you're back hunting!

I always thought that this was more of a "community/volunteer service" sort of operation. But apparently I was wrong and many users rely on that website to turn their metal detecting hobby into a for-profit business. To each their own.

Here's a pic or 2 of my EVA grip stopper donut thingy. It's janky, but it works. I'm going to work on a cleaner version eventually, now that I think I've settled on the Equinox 600 as my go-to detector.

These are virtually identical to what I see in my ground, whether a tot lot or located in the fairly mild top layer soil/dirt.

I have made a "grip stopper" out of EVA foam. It's a soft and squishy "donut" that allows much of the weight to be spread out over my thumb and index finger so my swinging hand barely has to grip the Equinox's control pod handle. Basically, it's a foam version of this:

In a few months, things will become much clearer. I have a feeling that the Deus II to the Equinox 800 will be more like comparing an Equinox 600 to a Vanquish 540 or Garrett Apex as opposed to comparing an Equinox 600 to a Bounty Hunter IV. In other words, noticeable differences in SMF performance and a few features, but nothing "groundbreaking."

I'll feel a lot better when I get rid of my two Tesoros...

That's putting it mildly...

I agree that lower sensitivity is better. But to possibly defend/explain the person who made the video (Iffy Signals?), they might conduct all tests using the highest sensitivity reasonably possible on their machine. This could be one way they try to keep different tests from different days/machine as consistent as possible.

This is a great point. But to defend the "fast swingers," it's also possible that they normally use a fast swing speed. And since that's their hunting style, that's the testing approach they use. When I know I'm in a high trash environment, I do slow down my swing speed a little bit. But I don't always know I'm in a high trash environment, especially at a new permission. So I use my "default" swing speed...which may or many not be faster compared to other metal detectorists. When I do my own nail board tests, I'm doing it using my personal default swing speed to see if, had the test actually been a real world hunt, would my detector have given me enough indication to dig or at the very least, take different action, ie slow down my swing, shorten the arc of my swing, swing from a different angle, adjust my sensitivty or other settings, etc.

Because some people would rather have 1 machine instead of 2 when actively hunting. The Deus II is also expected to be more rugged and handle wet/underwater envinronments better than the Equinox.

I could only get through the first 4 or 5 minutes of that. I'm a believer of the general idea that "the weakest person in the room is the loudest person in the room." That being said, I also understand the desire to respond to unfair/unwarranted criticisms. I'm also a believer that when you don't respond to a question or concern, the public will fill in the blanks themselves and it will often be with the with a worst case scenario. So I see N/M being in a possible catch-22 position. I'm rooting for N/M and the Legend. I hope it does well and gives Minelab and Garrett a few sleepless nights. I also hope the Deus II does well, although given it's price, I don't think it'll compete in the same way the Legend or even the Equinox 600 will. Lastly, I appreciate the approach N/M took with marketing the Legend, by calling out Minelab and their Equinox. But I'm not saying it's better or worse than XP's approach (a la, "I'll let the Deus II and its performance do the talking..."). I think I've finally settled on a primary metal detector (the Equinox 600) so I have no intention of buying either the Legend or Deus II any time soon. But I do love all these choices and can't wait to see what Garrett and Minelab release in response.

I always ground balance with the horshoe button "on" (all targets accepted)...or at least I try to. Although, when I ground balanced over that hole that boosted the GB number about 20 points, it's possible I didn't have all targets accepted. Hmm...