PSPR

But I'm wondering if Minelab can introduce a proprietary component into the Bluetooth LE so you have to buy their headphones to work with it. The solution, of course, would be to plug in a Bluetooth transmitter to the wired headphone jack on the detector and broadcast that to your own brand of headphones.

Wow!! We must be close! Although that ad is a bit on the strange side, GB_Amateur. And I would guess they needed 2 or 3 months lead time to get that ad in the publication so they must have been pretty sure of their release this year back then.

I've been searching and watching the videos on Youtube about the Manticore. Lately, I've noticed a big drop off of new videos. There are just a very few from Mexico and Brazil in the last 20 days or so including a couple on the beaches with very little detection action. None of the recent videos include the usual Minelab suspects demoing or explaining the features of the Manticore. This leads me to believe that either they are about to release a bunch of new videos or the release date is just a couple weeks if not days away. I am leaning toward the later.

I hope you are right, phrunt, on it being Bluetooth LE. I thought the Minelab reps said it was proprietary, though. Other than their Chief Engineer, some of the Minelab reps don't seem to have all the correct answers.

Wish I did!! I read on ONE dealer site that they expected the Manticore would be released at the end of November. Most dealers are suggesting much later. I think it is in the best interest of Minelab to release it ASAP because most places in the U.S. and Europe are going to be buried in snow by Christmas and nobody is going to want to buy right away if the ground is snow covered or frozen. If they rush it and the software isn't totally as they want it, they can always release an update in a month or so. I heard last month that the hardware was done and the software was 99% ready with just a few tweaks left to be decided. I also read that the Equinox was released late in a February. That makes since as people are tired of winter and dreaming about spring and getting out. So, they start buying their toys so they are ready for spring. This thinking argues against an after December release. If they don't get it out by early December they might as well wait until late February or March so the excitement doesn't go stale over the winter. Just my 2 cents.

Thanks again, GB. I don't mind hunting coins. Silver and gold coins are great. I don't even mind digging up clad. Here in Texas there is a lot of history. But the Texas Historical Commission thinks they own everything not on private property. They even got a law passed that anything over 100 years old dug up in a park, etc. is theirs. I'm not sure how they enforce that. Also, the law here says state parks are off limits but state property that is not a park or historical site is OK. Rivers and streams seem to be one of the most promising state properties to hunt. Most cities and towns let you hunt their parks, too, although you run into people now and then who don't like it. Lake beaches are also open so long as it isn't in a state park. I think I'm going to have to figure out how to cultivate some good private properties if I am going to metal detect consistently. I think the trend is to search on private property.

I get you point, strick. While everything you say is true, I think it will depend upon the location. Some places are not suitable to dig dozens of holes while other places, like the beach, it is just a matter of putting in the effort to scoop the targets.

I hope there will be some other option than the ML headphones. Otherwise I'll have to rely on the speaker next summer since it is way too hot to wear full headphones in the summer here. I sent Minelab a suggest to make a belt clip wireless device that we could plug our own low latency headphones into. I suspect that suggestion will probably go nowhere.

Oops. Didn't get the link copied to my clipboard properly on the 3rd video. Here it is.

Thank, GB. Yeah, I didn't watch close enough to realize he was using a Deus 1 I was just excited to see someone at least claiming to be able to recognize pull tabs. Thanks for the additional information on the Manticore, that's the sort of stuff I'm looking for. Minelab seems to release some info then wait a month then release some more then wait a month....... I'm hoping by the end of November they have a release date for us but I may be dreaming. I looked around a little more this evening and found three other videos that use the Nox and offer up some possible methods to identify pull tabs, caps and trash. These guys don't seem to be experts but they seem to have a couple good ideas they've probably gotten from others that might help without giving up on the gold. Maybe these are similar to the methods you are already using, GB. When I do get a Manticore shipped to me I'll be experimenting with these ideas as I learn the Manticore. Maybe the target trace will provide more info than I'm currently expecting with that regard. Here are the videos. The third video doesn't get to the ID part until about 6:07.

Good points longbow and GaryC. I never thought about pull tabs being so light that they don't sink very fast. I've always thought that the low mass of aluminum objects would provide some way to identify them with a detector, EM field. I guess in reality it's not so easy.

Wow! GB_Amateur I hope I didn't post a video in the Minelab section I shouldn't have. I didn't mean to upset you or anyone else. I just thought there was some info on IDing aluminum trash that I hadn't seen before in the video. Of course, we don't have a lot of info on how the Manticore is going to perform or even its overall capabilities. All we've seen are a few brief hunts in fields with pretty much only iron trash. There have been no videos, to my knowledge, of hunts in heavy pull tab trash areas or even on the beach. I've got my order in for the Manticore but I'm feeling a dearth of information/testing of the machine coming out of Minelab. I guess I'm feeling we are not being given information many of us need to make an informed decision and I'm wondering why. I wish they would put a couple Manticores in dealers hands for testing but I guess that isn't how a new model release works.

I think you are right, schoolofhardNox. However I did run across an interesting video from a guy who had some tricks to identify maybe 80% of the pull tabs and trash. He does use a Deus II but maybe some of this will apply to the Manticore.

While waiting for Minelab to announce the release of the Manticore I've been watching a few hunting/review videos of the competition - Specifically the Deuc II and the Legend. My main concern that I mentioned in my introduction post is determining when aluminum, specifically pull tabs or parts of tabs, is under the coil. In my common hunting grounds pull tabs are common everywhere. It seems those machines are totally unable to tell if aluminum is under the coil or a gold ring. To eliminate tabs a huge part of the jewelry TID's also must get eliminated. In one example I watched the reviewer scanned dozens of pull tabs he had collected and a dozen or so gold and silver rings that all varied in a range of 17 to 37 on his machine. Other than on a beach, if I even had the desire to dig up every pull tab the area would look like a bombing range when I was finished. And, with the greater depth of new detectors many the holes would be a foot deep or more. I really have no desire to dig up thousands of pull tabs. So, the question for me is whether the Minelab Manticore is going to be able to identify a pull tab or part of a tab vs. a gold or silver ring? I don't see how the TID's are going to be any more accurate in this regard than existing detectors. The only advantage it my have is the Target Trace which shows the shape of the electromagnetic field around a target. While this is going to help eliminate aluminum cans and slaw, is it going to provide an advantage in identifying the various pull tabs vs. a gold ring. I'm thinking pull tabs are going to come in with a similar shape to rings and coins on target trace and be of little value distinguishing between the two. I'll go ahead and order a Manticore as soon as they are released but I'm feeling very disappointed that I'm going to probably not be able to identify pull tabs from jewelry with this machine.

Isn't this weekend's Minelab event in New York the last scheduled presentation of the Manticore in the U.S.? If so, maybe a release date is coming in November while the iron is hot? Thoughts?

Yeah, I did a little more checking. It seems my Bitdefender anti-virus thinks there is a virus on the page and is blocking it. Sort of weird.

Clive, what is going on with your clivesgoldpage.com link? I clicked it and got this error: Access to clivesgoldpage.com was denied You don't have authorization to view this page. HTTP ERROR 403

The reps have been saying typically 9 hours of use on the Manticore before it needs a recharge (7 hours for that). The Nox, I believe, was being advertised as 12 hours. But the Manticore is supposed to have more battery power than the Nox so I assume it is also drawing more for other features as well. I think you can connect a power block to either to extend the usable time.

I saw someone selling a few Nokta Legend's that were in a "damaged box" at a discount. I emailed them to make sure it would come with the full warranty but the reply just said it was sold as "new". Not sure if that meant it had the warranty or not. Anyway, I decided I was going to order a Manticore instead so I never investigated further.

Do you really want this answer rled2005? Well, here goes. The manual for the Equinox 800 states that the Radio Frequency Power (should be the power to the coil) is less than 30 dBm. 30 dBm converts to the equivalent of 1000 MiiiWatts or 1 Watt. So, if the Manticore is 50% more powerful than the Equinox that would equate to 1500 MiliWatts or 1.5 Watts. I believe radio transmitters such as a CB radio are required to transmit no more that 5 Watts of power. So, the Manticore is still using much less energy than a CB radio.

Thanks for posting Jeff's post on the TID's, GB. That's helpful. I know that the Minelab chief engineer said they gave the Manticore 100 TID's so they could spread out that clump of signals in the high teens that many metals fell into with the Nox. I noticed Jeff had many finds in that range too in his post. It's the target trace that has me most excited about the Manticore. I'm hoping that will guide me away from a lot of trash. East Texas, If the Manticore turns out to be everything I hope it could be maybe I'll venture farther out of town (I'm in Flower Mound NW of Dallas) to meet up sometime.

Hi, everyone. I've been lurking around this forum for a month or so and decided I need to join. There are a lot of Detector Pros here and I appreciate the advice they provide. I'm not new to metal detecting but I'm far from an expert. I actually bought my first Metal Detector back in the '70's or so. It was a Metrotech!! I doubt many here even know that name. Here's a video of the device It just had a beep and a meter. I used that detector on an off for many years to search parks and school yards in the Denver area. I would have loved to go prospecting but the detectors back then weren't up to the task. I recall it being very frustrating digging up all the junk I was finding in parks. Sure, I found a few silver coins but nothing really exciting. I remember once I located a silver dime spill in a school yard on their manicured lawn. I dug out some of them then felt so bad about digging up the lawn that I just covered up the rest of them and never went back. They are probably still there. LOL I don't think that detector went very deep, probably just a few inches if that. Through the years I kept reading about Garrett and his progress with better and better detectors but my interest waned on metal detecting and I developed other interests. Finally about 15 years ago the bug struck again. I read about the great discriminating machines Minelab was making and bought an Explorer. My bane has been the fact that pull tabs came up in about the same place jewelry was appearing. It seemed all I was doing was digging up pull tabs and aluminum cans. So, I bought the next iteration of the latest and greatest Minelab detector but still it seemed all I did was dig up aluminum. So, I sold the new machine, kept the explorer and told myself I wasn't going to detect again until someone made a much better discrimination detector. Now, I'm retired and the detecting bug is striking again. I have more time now but a lot less energy than I used to but I need to find something that will get me out of the house and getting some exercise. At the same time I began to hear about the Minelab Manticore and wondered, could this be the detector I've been wanting for the last 50 years? Well, I doubt it but I've ordered one anyway. I'll just have to see if this works for me or if I get frustrated again digging up lots of trash. If I disappear from the forum sometime next year, you'll know what happened --- unless it was my questionable heart health that sent me off to detect in another realm.