phrunt

Skilled repair, I couldn't have done better myself, in fact I'd probably do quite a bit worse ? I'm sure Garrett will replace the cuff for you no problems at all. My experience with Garrett has been nothing but positive. I've never had to use warranty on my Garrett products but they've been plenty helpful in other ways when I've needed it buying bits and pieces and even helping me get a detector I couldn't buy locally by assisting by getting it all the way from the US of A.

Thanks for the post, I had a friend who tried out the Gold Finder 2000 and was quite disappointed by its fine gold performance vs the GM1000 which he was more used to using, the 24k on the other hand is a beast!

I can just picture you sitting in the sand in your budgie smugglers pushing it around looking for coins Mitchel ? You maybe able to retire your Nox.

I for one won't be flashing back, in my mild soils the update is exactly what I was hoping for. It's kept depth the same while improving target ID's.

ahh yup, I was able to replicate your detectors setting behaviour. Damn, I was hoping it was as simple as you needed a replacement detector.

Sorry about the bad lighting, but there is most certainly something wrong with your firmware, it really makes no sense either but with mine, as is meant to happen when you change stabliser off 0 it's meant to turn on, and off when you go back to 0, yours doesn't do this and that to me makes absolutely no sense, you still have a software problem. Maybe your Manticore has bad memory corrupting the files as what you're getting is weird, it makes no sense, they should all behave the exact same running the same software unless something is corrupting the software and in your case it sounds like that's exactly what's happening. I'm just trying to translate your issue into computers as that's what I know and for example if you were to have a computer with a bad memory module and you flash it's bios with an update you will get corruption in the update, it could be as simple as text doesn't come out how you expect or it could be much more of an issue causing the flash to fail, but a common thing was something like the bootloader screen normally saying American Megatrends AMI Bios version 101.10 or something, and after the flash with the bad memory it would say A%mer-can M^gatrends AM7 Biov ver0sion 1.~!.`10 with the code being damaged in the transfer by the bad memory. This seems to me like it's what's happening with your detector, something similar. I don't think your problem is firmware related, I think you've got a faulty detector.

I think a mistake Minelab have made is allowing saved settings to transfer across between firmware versions. An example of this is when people roll back firmware versions they've had things like the big red numbers exist and stuck on with a firmware that didn't even have them. I think best practice with Manticore firmware updates would be the factory reset before and after updating which is what I did with mine, and generally always do on detectors that update. A habit I learnt over the years flashing many thousands of laptop and computer motherboards. It's always best to start from a clean slate.

Some interesting reading. https://www.tuko.co.ke/416534-rick-ness-net-worth-how-earn-episode.html

For a "Rubbish show" someones watching it, A few headlines about Gold Rush, DISCOVERY’S #1 RATED AND MOST WATCHED SERIES “GOLD RUSH” RETURNS FOR AN ALL-NEW SEASON DISCOVERY’S #1-RATED SHOW ‘GOLD RUSH’ RETURNS FOR ITS LANDMARK 10TH SEASON WITH NEW CLAIMS, CREWS AND CHALLENGES DISCOVERY CHANNEL’S GOLD RUSH SEASON SIX PREMIERE TOPS ALL OF TELEVISION ON FRIDAY IN MEN 25-54 GOLD RUSH ENDS SEASON FIVE WITH BEST SEASON FINALE EVER AND 6.4 MILLION VIEWERS GOLD RUSH SETS SEASON RECORD WITH 6.1 MILLION VIEWERS ON FRIDAY JANUARY 30 Discovery Channel's GOLD RUSH was the #1 program in ALL OF TELEVISION among M25-54, M18-49 and M18-34 delivery for the fourth consecutive week, no exclusions on Friday, January 23, based upon Nielsen's Live +3 Discovery Channel hit the mother lode on Friday, Oct. 16 as GOLD RUSH returned for an all-new season and ranked as Friday night’s #1 telecast on All of Television among Men 25-54, topping all its Prime Time television competitors, including FOX’s ALCS game #1 (by +9%), ABC’s Shark Tank and CBS’ Blue Bloods, among others in L+3. GOLD RUSH also beat FOX’s ALCS game #1 in Adults 25-54 (by +7%). GOLD RUSH on cable was #1 across Adults/Men/Women 25-54/18-49, Adults and Men 18-34 and Total Viewers P2+, while Discovery was the #1 cable network for the night among Adults, Men, Women and Total Viewers P2+. It's just some entertainment, it doesn't have to be 100% real and showing it how it is. It has to be a show that has viewers that want to watch it, and for that it's been an extraordinary success. That's why there are so many seasons and spin offs.

WOWOWOWOWOW they've made the 6" Concentric coil. I'm so glad they're including coil covers, the covers are just impossible to get in NZ otherwise, and importing a coil cover from the USA costs what you guys pay for the coil ? I guess they felt the other sizes were not going to be good sellers, but in reality that Concentric is the must have coil for 24k owners. This is great news, thanks Garrett.

At least VLF's have plenty of competition, if it was anything like the lack of competition for PI type gold detectors the Manticore would be on offer for $8000.

Probably true, Target ID's are certainly a shortcut to some success. For the average beginner learning the usage and nuances of a no-ID detector would be enough to put many off the hobby although a lot of the entry level type no ID detectors just have a beep or door bell with no way to discern targets.

Have you just considered doing a factory reset to see if it changes it back?

I don't know why but it seems difficult soil people are less happy with the update perhaps and mild soil people and finding it fantastic. I personally am happy with it, in fact I'm now pretty happy with my Manticore and it has potential to be my favourite VLF once I get more coils for it, that's my sticking point at the moment, no big and no small coil. I was a bit disappointed at the start with it's bouncy ID's and now that's come pretty good with the update. The small gold sensitivity now looks to be at least equal to the Nox when testing 11" vs 11". It will be interesting if it can pull ahead when it's got the small coil as if the smaller coil = less EMI and I can crank that gain up further I think the Manticore may win. As a coin hunting detector all I care about is deep coins and the update has maintained its depth, I'm seeing no difference in depth at all, with the only difference better ID's. I'm really pleased Minelab listened about the small gold thing, when I emailed them in Australia about it and they said they would look into it and try improve it I thought that was just a way of blowing me off, then the firmware comes up with it improved I couldn't believe it. They weren't aware on very tiny gold it was worse than the Equinox, I guess being Aussies they're used to bigger gold so all comparison tests would have been done with 0.0.3 of a gram and up or something, calling that tiny gold, but I was after the 0.00X of a gram stuff which the Nox was good at, now the Manticore seems like it is also. I like the idea of the big red numbers, if you're using the detector underwater they're much easier to see on the screen too than a little line.

I had forgotten about that, I must revisit it, thanks ? For anyone wondering, a time saving link

You make some sense there, however volume of sales eats up development costs, by charging so much they're limiting the volume of sales. It's long been a struggle of the business owner, to come in at cheaper prices and get massive volume of sales or try give the impression of high end and charge more knowing less sales. Either method can work, I think the Equinox hit the sweet spot of affordably vs performance then Nokta came in and has largely taken that away from them with cheaper prices due to their manufacturing costs and whatever other reasons, clearly they're still making a great profit growing to be one of the big players in a small amount of time and this hasn't been unnoticed by Minelab and their lawyers. Many of the US manufacturers can't compete in a global market because of the costs of producing product at home, Minelab if made in Australia would encounter the same problem with some of the highest wages in the world which is why they moved to a much cheaper country for manufacturing using Malaysia's cheap labour among other things, truck drivers in Australia can earn more than doctors in many countries. So while manufacturing costs may seem like they could be much more, in the right countries they're really not all that much different. I know a guy that invented some odd contraption to use a chainsaw for wood carving, to manufacturer locally it wasn't going to be viable, people won't pay over a thousand for it, so he took a gamble and outsourced as a small business manufacturing to Asia, it ended up costing him a very small amount per unit just over $100 even with shipping included and it has turned into quite a good business. Imagine how good this process works for bigger manufacturers.

Wonder if our buddy @strick can x-ray some Manticore coils to see what's going on in there ? I don't think they should cost that, they proved with the Vanquish they can make Nox coils a lot cheaper than they do, then the X-terra comes out and further reassures us we are being taken for a ride. I'm sure even if Manticore coils are slightly more complex the cost to make them wouldn't be all that much more. If XP were aiming at doing cheaper prices with their gear the Manticore would be a lot cheaper than it is, XP kept the pricing high thereby opening up Minelab to do another high priced detector, if it was just Nokta vs Minelab you would watch the Minelab prices fall off a cliff.

I wonder why you were only finding big nuggets with the stock coil? For me it's been very sensitive and easily finding 0.03 of a gram nuggets and similar more often than any others. Maybe your stock coil is one of the many duds.

Keep us updated when you've flashed back if your detector comes right, very interested in this as it's such a weird thing. I guess Minelab USA being just middle men didn't know, that's why it's best to speak to service@minelab.com.au for stuff, they know what they're talking about. I don't know how we all missed the dots ? The ML105 have the same dots for it.

Just put the video up, you won't hurt Minelab's feelings, they don't have any ?

Yup, whoops, just woke up. ?

Are you getting this many nuggets on a day trip Mitchel or is this a bunch that you've found over time? I'm quite jealous of the quantities. Rarely do I come home with as many at a time as you're showing in these past few outings.

I think the change in flash tool is related to the processor change to the Nordic, the Equinox was a different tool for the different hardware, it flashed the bootloader and as part of the flash and if it fails or is corrupted then kiss it goodbye, which is why if with your Equinox and detectors like the Legend if your flash is interrupted from a power loss or you knocking your USB cable out you can brick your detector, with the Manticore you can rip your cord out in the middle of the update all you like, multiple times, all you have to do is plug your detector in and start the process again, the worst case scenario doing this is you may lose any saved settings. The Manticore doesn't seem to update the firmware on an EEPROM at all, it seems as if it's copying files onto some internal storage more like how the operating system runs on a computer and part of this process would always be CRC checking just like it is with an EEPROM firmware flash, if a file lands on there and CRC checks incorrectly the tool would reattempt the transfer and if it keeps erroring on the CRC check the tool would report an error and say update failed. Minelab won't be the ones making the flash tool, they're customizing a manufacturer supplied tool, putting the user interface onto it basically. They could easily release an older version tool for people to roll back if they wanted to, they'll have that readily available, they've been chopping the firmware around on test detectors for a year or more. I believe you'd have to roll back your headphones too as the headphones don't seem to connect to the new firmware until they're updated as well so they would have to also release a rollback headphone firmware. I have no doubt Daniel has a problem, but I wonder if the problem was preexisting and the new firmware made it apparent, like a slightly out of spec coil or something. It would be so good if someone lived right near him and could troubleshoot it together swapping coils and playing around to directly compare the two. It would be good if Minelab put an initial release firmware on their website for people to roll back if they wanted to for whatever reason.

The story under it with the history of gold thieves in Australia was a good read https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-04-03/gold-stealing-history-western-australia-perth-mint/102170820

They took your money for a product that doesn't even exist? That's crazy.