Tom Slick

I bought my first "Nugget" hunting detector from Jim, a Compass Gold Scanner Pro. Jim and I both belonged to a couple of different detecting/prospecting clubs back in the 80's & 90's, Chino Valley Prospectors and Riverside Treasure Hunters. Jim and his books have been a great help to me over the years and a man I truly look up to in the field of detecting.

All is good now. Misprint in the manual. Manual states Select & Options buttons but should read Settings & Options buttons. At turn on detector will show Ld then flash either In or Cm.

You're supposed to be able to change the Kruzer to read Inches instead of centimeters while by holding down the Select and Options buttons simultaneously while turning the detector on. Another forum member found that on his detector he had to hold the Settings and Options buttons while turning it on to make the chance. Mine won't change trying either method. Mine shows Ld while doing this. Anyone else having the same issue? Of course mine's stuck in centimeters.

In about 100 gold rings found, only three had the same VDI (18-19) as a nickle on White's detectors.

There is no Gold detector that can ONLY find gold, and no coin detector that can ONLY find coins. They are all METAL detectors. They all can find gold, coins, cans, washers, nails, pulltabs, etc. The soil covering the earth changes drasticly from place to place. Sometimes in a matter of feet. Metal detectors have to try and "see" metal hidden in this soil matrix. The issue is that some of the minerals in the soil can also be detected by the detector so engineers do their best at designing a detector that perform this function. It's like trying to see when it's super foggy. You have to try to see where you're going and the fog keeps getting in the way. So there are different detectors designed for different tasks. What if someone handed you a hammer and said go build a house. Why don't they make a, hammer, saw, drill, screwdriver, tape measure tool. you know, one tool that you only have to change the head (coil). This is why I recommended not starting with a V3i until you fully understand how a detector works. Do you fully understand these functions and features? Sensitivity or Gain, Discrimination or ID Filter, Threshold, Tones, Tone Breaks, Ground Filters, Reactivity, recovery speed, recovery delay, mixed mode, DC phase, preamp gain, correlate, best Data, VDI, Accumulate, Bottlecap reject, hot rock reject, S.A.T. VCO, Modulation, Autotrac, Ground balance, GB Offset, VDI Normalization, sweep speed, A.C. Sensitivity, D.C. Sensitivity, RX gain, Autotrac offset, etc. Start with a detector that is user friendly, designed to do what you want to do. When you're starting out; you don't want to be making a bunch of adjustments, you want to go find stuff! It's too easy to get frustrated trying to understand all the adjustments on conplex detectors. This hobby is all about having fun finding stuff and that's what a person should do. Take a person fishing for the first time. If they catch a bunch of fish, they'll love it. A person that gets skunked their first time out never wants to go fishing again. JMHO

NuggetBuddy, Your first post you asked what is the most High Tech, User Friendly detector for coins., and what WE would use if we could only have one detector. Here's my input for what it's worth. There is no such thing as "most High-Tech, most user friendly" the two don't go together. I'm not going to offer a recommendation for a detector. I posted what I'd choose for me but there is no way I can say what's best for you. I will say that IMHO the V3i is not a detector for a first timer no matter how quick a study you are. There are so many adjustments on the V3i that many, many experienced users switched back to a familiar detector after trying the V3i. Changing one adjustment can have a pyramid effect where you make one change to a setting and then you have to make many more adjustments to other settings to reap the rewards. Without having a very broad understanding on all the adjustments, and terminology (detector lingo) you can easily end up lost and having poorer performance than you started with. I Bought a V3i when they first came out 4/2009 and used in almost daily till 2016. This after 40 years using detectors. The V3i is a great all around detector but not one for a first timer. Same goes for the E-Trac and CTX. You also stated you wanted a coin detector that can be used for gold. While the three mentioned above will all find gold rings, they all fall way short for nugget hunting. They stink at finding naturally occurring gold. A few detectors that perform well for coins and nuggets would be the Minelab 705, White's MXT Pro, Fisher Gold Bug Pro, & F19, Teknetics G2 & G2+, Makro Racer 2, and Nokta Impact. These aren't the deepest coin detectors but they work almost as well and are Way better at nugget shooting than the other three mentioned above. These are also much less expensive and much easier to learn to operate properly. If there was one detector that was the best at finding coins and the best at finding nuggets and was the most user friendly, it would put all others out of business. Tom

I hope they ship today or folks will start thinking "you can't trust anything Minelab says".

Nokta Impact for my type of hunting. Waiting to see how the Minelab Equinox and Makro Kruzer work for me.

Multi-Kruzer ordered along with two accessory coils.

Yes. The only difference is that the Racer 2 requires the dongle and the Impact doesn't. I have both the Racer 2 and the Impact along with three sets of the wireless headphones. I can use any set with either detector. They also work on my Gold Racer.

Brian - Thanks for posting the video. Looks like I'll be on the waiting list for the Kruzer.

Thanks. I agree that the Makro headphones don't have the best sound quality, especially when compared to Killer B's or SunRay Pro Golds. I still use those in cold or noisy environments, but it's sooo nice nice not being tethered to the detector that my Makro's get used 95% of the time I'm using the Impact or Racer 2.

The beach mode is set up to handle the affects of the salt in the salt water. There's no reason to use Beach mode while hunting fresh water beach sand, wet or dry.

Steve - How do the Minelab wireless headphones compare to the Makro/Nokta wireless headphones. Shape, size, weight, sound etc?

Now, If we could only get a BigFoot coil for the Equinox. Then I could sell my three DFX's like I did with the V3i. I've about given up on getting a BigFoot for my Racer 2 and Impact. Steve - I actually found my first nugget with an Eagle II SL 90.5 with a GoldFoot coil.

I have a Sovereign GT that is only used on the wet saltwater beach sand. I don't use it on the dry as it's heavy (though I hip mount mine) and it's not as good on the small gold as a couple of other detectors I prefer to swing on the dry. The Excal is too heavy for the dry and the wet sand, (I'm old) and it's expensive. My only use of the Excal would be wading in the surf as the west coast surf is usually to rough to actually hunt in, at least the beaches I hunt. To be able to have a waterproof to 10' detector that runs multi frequencies, is light enough to swing for hours on the dry sand, and all this for $900. Just what the Doctor ordered. In addition I can use it in the local fresh water lakes, and hit the parks for some silver that's been hiding next to trash, I'm ready! Of course this is JMHO. Will it be the best at all detecting? NO, but I think it will be a darn good all arounder.

I bought $1,000 worth of halves about 10 years ago from the bank. I got about 8 silvers out of them, not worth the effort that time for me. Couple of weeks ago my wife went to the bank and noticed some halves in the teller's drawer and asked if she could have them. $15.00 worth netted seven 90% silver Kennedy's and a 1942 Walking Liberty. Score!

Here's another vote for the White's Eagle. Being able to save programs, dead on depth measurement, and the ability to Learn to accept or reject a target had me sold, though I couldn't part with my Compass Gold Scanner Pro until the Eagle II SL 90.5 was released.

I want an Equinox so I can sell my Sovereign Elite, Sovereign GT, Tesoro Tiger Shark, Makro Gold Racer, Fisher F19, and possibly my Nokta Impact. It sounds like the Equinox will do everything these other detectors do for me with the exception of the Impact and I still have a Racer 2 for those iron infested sites should the Equinox not be the best at those ghost town sites.

There are always a lot of detectors going cheap on Fleebay this close to Christmas. People selling to raise extra money for presents and not many buyers for the same reason. Then there's the fact that many of the states are too cold to detect this time of year so you have a depressed market. That all changes (for the most part) after the Holidays and detector prices raise again.

On the 600 you have a choice of three single frequencies plus MF which is five frequencies. On the 800 you have a choice of five single frequencies plus MF which is five frequencies. The difference being that the two additional single frequencies available on the 800 (20 & 40 kHZ) are not selectible or available on the 600.

Just in! New England states will be getting the Equinox next spring after the snow and ice melts. The Southwest will be receiving the Equinox this month as it's prime detecting weather there right now!

Brian - You'll notice my Racer 2 isn't included in the above list of detectors to sell nor is my Impact. I don't see the equinox replacing either of them.

I'm on a waiting list for the 800. I'm more interested in how far down the list. I don't know if I should start selling my other detectors now or sometime next year! Anyone looking for a Tesoro Tiger Shark, Sovereign Elite, Sovereign GT, Makro Gold Racer, or NIB Fisher F19 ?

There used to be Allied Prospecting in Anaheim, Pedersons detectors in Orange County, Stapp Mining in San Bernardino, and Strike it Rich Detecting & Prospecting in Riverside. Probably all closed by now. I know Strike it Rich is closed as that was my shop in the later 80's early 90's and I sold it Don Brown in 1994. .