Search the Community

I am still waiting for a good test and comparison on the E-800 vs the V3i. I know the E-800 is far simpler but ............. How do these two stack up.

White's V3i Information page

Just to prove those who know how.. can find gold nugget pickers with the the Multi Purpose White's V3i.

I just purchased a brand White's V3i from the factory as noted on another thread. The brand new machine much to my surprise comes with new new redesign of the White's D2 10" round DD coil. I say surprise because I ordered a scuff cover for the coil, and although it went on the scuff cover is larger than the new coil, especially along the inner edge of the right side and so there are large gaps between the edges of the coil and the scuff cover. The new coil has been shaved here and there for a thinner more modern appearance versus the older squared off look. I looked and have seen no change in the part number on any sites nor any mention of this new coil anywhere. White's needs to make this known and hopefully a properly fitted scuff cover is available or in the works. It could be it just happened and I am one of the first with this coil and so jumped the gun a bit while dealers clear old stock. The old D2 coil has been quoted at 17.9 oz or 498 grams which I have to question as my new coil weighs 1 lb 2.6 oz (18.6 oz) or 526 grams on my postal scale. Can anyone get get an accurate weight on the old D2 coil? Include the cable as I have done - I hate it when cable weights are excluded, as if we are going to swing the coil without a cable. That may account for the discrepancy as I find it hard to believe the new coil weighs more than the old coil, unless the internal windings are different/heavier. This coil is also compatible with the White's VX3, all versions of the MXT, the MX5, M6, and DFX.

An amazingly nice job by this person.... http://metaldetectingforum.com/showthread.php?t=243881

Has anyone used one of these machines in AZ, I went to my local dealer and was told the V3i was not good in AZ, I should get a F75.... Wanted some other opinion on using one in AZ, I live in the Kingman area and want to hunt coins. I have an OLD MXT and would like to get a newer , top of the line coin hunter. Tried hunting gold but due to leg damage I have trouble walking in the dessert . Took a bad fall a couple of days ago , bruised some ribs. Made me think I need to hunt for coins, tot lots nd such. OK , 'nough of my crap . Any opinions... Thanks

Which do you consider the best of the two and why? Thanks Bill

Hoping someone can help me out. I just need to know in basic terms what is the best way to customize a program? I spent an hour or so modifying the coins and jewelry program to be an exact copy of Magic's renowned program only to accidentally overwrite my changes in the last steps. So I just want to know what method (steps) I should use to modify the program and then rename it as "Magic". I'd like to retain the coins and jewelry program as well so ultimately I'd prefer to overwrite the 'common' program. thanks in advance, Hibby

Which of these two would you consider the best for coins etc? Thanks Bill

I've had a lot of machines come and go since I began the hobby. One machine I will not part with is my V3i. About a year ago at tax return time money was no object in the realm of hobby machines. I could plunk down cash on a CTX-3030, XP Deus or trade up to a V3i. It was a difficult decision and one that required research, and even hands on testing to determine what was the best fit for me. The following is a compilation of the arguments that convinced me to go with a V3i: The V3i is a true 3 frequency machine. FBS machines, although the claim is made that they TRANSMIT 28 frequencies, apparently only USE (transmit, receive and process) only 2 fundamental frequencies (3.125khz, 25khz). http://www.dankowskidetectors.com/discussions/read.php?2,24272,page=1Those frequencies emit harmonic byproducts which are not actually utilized, but which any machine can claim to transmit. Whites could follow this business philosophy and claim to transmit 42 or more, but this is not helpful. The V3i can operate in single frequency mode. The CTX-3030 cannot. Being able to operate in single frequency mode provides a depth and speed advantage as all the power of the the machine is dedicated to that particular frequency rather than divided up among many. Conversely, the XP Deus operates in selectable single frequencies, but cannot process them simultaneously, putting it at a disadvantage in discrimination and higher mineralization . The V3i is true SIMULTANEOUS multifrequency, meaning all 3 frequencies are transmitted at the same time. Often what is referred to as "simultaneous" is a loose interpretation of the term. What is really happening is their frequencies are transmitted in a timed automated sequence and processed in the time domain rather than simultaneously. This approach causes a greater delay in recovery and target separation often overlooking good targets in iron infested sites. The V3i offers by far the most access to feature parameters that are usually only available to the manufacturer. When features are locked to certain specific presets a machine will perform reasonably well across most conditions, but will not be optimized. The V3i offers you the option of optimizing its performance in any conditions. This has caused many novice and even experienced detectorists to become intimidated by the V3i. Don't be. The V3i has turn on and go modes and factory defaults like any other machine. In every endeavor the V3i seeks to offer the best of both worlds. It offers you the chance to reach your full potential across all mediums in your own time as you figure out what works best for you, or simply use factory programs. The Spectragraph. This allows the user to see what is going on with any one or all three of the frequency it utilizes. It is more information and tell tale signs to help determine the size and composition of the target. It is more information to help determine whether to dig or not to dig. VDI systems are imperfect predictors on every machine. Many variables affect its accuracy and so it is just one consideration among many regarding whether to dig or not to dig. The V3i is more consistently "hot" across the spectrum of metals than either the Deus and CTX-3030. You'll often notice in the forums that smaller gold is not the strong suit of FBS machines. Due to their configuration, they favor high conductors and overlook smaller gold. The Deus in similar fashion needs a whole different and very expensive coil to notice small, low conductors such as gold. (With the Deus, this is the equivalent of buying a whole new metal detector, because the coil IS the metal detector. The pod only deals with information. That is why it is referred to as a "remote." That's all it truly is. So each time you purchase a coil you are forced to buy all the other hardware that is usually housed in the control box over and over again. These coils will necessarily have to be serviced at some point due to its hardwired battery. The likelihood of long term failure of such a configuration is concerning as well considering that all the sensitive electronics are housed in the most vulnerable part of the machine. Imagine taking your control box off and bumping it up against stubby corn stalks, rocks, tree trunks and other hard mediums over an extended period of time.)

Is this detector any good for prospecting for what it costs? Pros & Cons Thanks Bill

The mail delivered my VX3...put batteries in it and took it to my test garden....wow , blew me away.....tried it with the 950 coil and 6x10 coil......waiting for my ultimate 13" coil . I got a couple of hunted places I want to try. So far....VERY HAPPY . I have an MXT but this is a different critter for sure.

Finds first for the TLDR people. As the finds in my current primary patch dwindle in numbers from being worked heavily the past two years, I'm scouting for a new primary patch to begin working. Using the criteria and method outlined in a previous post, I've located a very good location that is certain to hold gold, silver, and more. Today will be my first time boots on the ground at that location and I'll walk the reader through it along with my scouting method. Maybe it will help someone and provide insight or encouragement. Here is the sat. view 5 playgrounds, one skate park, basketball, tennis, two soccer fields, two softball fields, two shelters, one former 1890's to 1950's church location on site. Here are my paths while scouting. Deus in red, V3i in green. So, from the sat. images there are many hot-spots to strike, and I won't try to get them all as this is a long term prospect, and I only desire to determine 3 primary things today. 1. Pressure - hunting pressure from other detectorists. 2. Trash composition and density. 3. Presence - Is there jewelry where I expect it to be. Deus gets the top spot today as it's the ideal scouting unit. Light, fast, great tones to read the trash. From the parking lot I begin and move to the skate park since it's close and can hold silver and junk jewelry along with lots of coins. Foil seems to be the primary trash along the way, and around the skate feature the aluminum kicks in - light can slaw and tabs primarily. I can hear lots and lots of coins, zinc and copper cents mostly, but a healthy quantity of dimes as well. I select a few targets I know are quarters and pennies, then intentionally sample some of the larger better sounding trash before moving on. The primary traffic flow from one side of the park to another is divided by a slight drainage ditch with the easiest pass being on either end... and people naturally take the easiest route, so I do too. Pennies everywhere! Zinc mostly, healthy dose of copper, decent selection of dimes, quite a few quarters...light trash mostly foil and ferrous bits... but I keep on moving through without digging a single target. Not interested today. Moving to the goal at the primary soccer field I work my way over to the nearest corner, then down the sideline to mid-field before cutting over to the center. Then I work my way to the opposite goal before coming around the back net. From there, and because of its close proximity to the goal, I briefly enter the playground before hitting the nearest corner of the soccer field diagonally opposite from the first corner I hit. Quarters everywhere! I decide to spend some time here sampling, cherry picking the best sounds. Within 10 minutes I found the heart pendant necklace. Jewelry confirmed, nice. So I pause, crank up the notch to 93 and take all the quarters before moving on. Erasing the notch I notice an area of the playground is different. Something was removed and not replaced. I suspect one of the super dangerous merry-go-rounds that children today get no experience or joy from used to be there. Clad everywhere....move on. Swing-set looks vintage so I check that and the mostly abandoned softball backstop area nearby. The trash picks up and bottle caps start to appear below the coil. I dug a first (for this park) beavertail ring pull, nice...a sign there might be some silver coins lurking around here. I'm getting hot by now so start thinking of shade and where to find some. It's scarce, so good places to concentrate. I mentally discriminate everything but quarters. Lots of nice signals, lots of trash and rusty caps. So far this is the trashiest area and I'm impressed it's not worse. Out of water and thirsty, I head back to the parking lot where I started, taking any quarters I come across. There are so many coins around it's obvious to me this park has never been heavily worked over by much of anyone in a long time, if ever. This place is a clad mine. Exactly how my current patch started out! I switch out units for the V3i and head towards the nearby secondary soccer field goal. I work one small corner of the goal net taking everything in a 6 foot diameter...clad and tabs mostly. Then I work right down the field towards the only clump of trees between the two fields and casually work the area randomly, still cherry picking signals but expanding the range down below zinc cents a little plus taking all nickel range targets as I find them. Getting tired and hot I'm thinking of wrapping it up so I head out to the sideline and try to find the trash zone where people sit and spectate. There isn't much trash to detect so I decide to just pick a line inside the playing field and take everything not obviously trash out of the ground. As I reached the corner of the field the silver ring shows up. Someone threw the ball into play and lost a ring perhaps. Now we're talking! Satisfied with the mission I walked off and swung over the curb area near the parking lot to get a feel for the trash there, too. With light to moderate trash, tons of clad signals, two pieces of jewelry - I have all the intel I need to know that this park is going to produce a few gold items, eventually. I'm hesitant to give 5 stars so we'll rate it at a 4 plus star park, IMO. Next hunt the tedious process of clad layer removal begins, oh, joy. Thanks for your time. Good hunting.

I have been bouncing back and forth between the White's DFX and V3i for many years. In theory the switch to V3i should be a no-brainer. However, the original Vision model I got had bad EMI issues in Anchorage, Alaska, especially with buried power lines. When the V3i came out I tried again with no joy. When I moved to Reno I tried again, and EMI was less a problem. The next issue is the main reason I have a DFX is to run a BigFoot coil. Most coils need to be tuned for the specific detector operating frequency. The BigFoot is tuned for 3 kHz and 15 kHz especially for the MXT/DFX series. My BigFoot works well enough in V3i 2.5 kHz and 7.5 kHz single frequency modes. However, in 22.5 kHz single frequency mode or in three frequency mode the target id (VDI) numbers all skew very high (they tripled on the last V3i that I had). This more or less limited the BigFoot to being used only in 7.5 kHz mode on the V3i where I would generally prefer to use 22.5 kHz single frequency mode. The coil runs just fine on the DFX in 15 kHz mode so after lots of back and forth I finally settled on the DFX. The DFX has weaknesses however. The DFX always transmits a combined dual frequency waveform. When single frequency mode is chosen, the machine still transmits the same waveform optimized for dual frequency use, but simply ignores half the return signal to process either the 3 kHz portion or the 15 kHz portion. The transmit waveform is not optimized for single frequency and so some punch is lost compared to a dedicated single frequency machine like the MXT. The V3i in single frequency mode actually modifies the transmit waveform for use at the single frequency. It is still not quite as efficient as a dedicated single frequency detector, but a big improvement over the DFX way of doing things. The V3i also adds transmit boost capability, that can bring that last little bit of lost performance as compared to a dedicated single frequency detector. The lost efficiency shows up more as shorter battery life than actual lost performance. Second, the DFX while in multi frequency mode is always locked into "Salt Mode" for saltwater beach operation, effectively tuning out the salt range. This unfortunately means that small gold capability is degraded in DFX dual frequency mode. The V3i allows the salt mode operation to be deactivated while in multi frequency mode, allowing for better small gold performance while in MF mode. The closest the DFX can get is to run in a single frequency mode, which turns off the dual frequency salt compensation. But now you are back to running a less optimized single frequency mode as compared to the V3i in single frequency mode. Long story short there are too many benefits and neat features on the V3i that I have been denying myself due to my desire for BigFoot compatibility. The fact is I normally run the BigFoot in 15 kHz single frequency mode on my DFX for a little extra gold hots. However, after some thought I have decided the V3i running at an optimized 7.5 kHz is likely just as good if not better than the DFX running a "soft" 15 kHz. So I did talk myself into a new V3i recently. In theory the V3i at 22.5 kHz should be a decent nugget detector, but you rarely hear of it being used as such. Part of that is a ground balance issue. The DFX and V3i tracking systems really are not up to working that well in heavily mineralized ground. The DFX does offer a normal manual ground balance mode with both a coarse and fine adjust, although you have to dive into the menu to access it - not so handy for making constant tweaks. The V3i actually has no true Manual ground balance mode. The best you can do is track and lock, as on the MXT. However, the V3i "Live Controls" can be set up to give the operator direct access to a ground balance offset that can tweak the "locked" setting up or down. That may actually be easier to access and use than the DFX version of manual ground balance but I need to play around more to find out for sure. White's DFX and White's V3i metal detectors

Very good post by Mike Hillis at Dankowski's on V3i filtering options and how they affect performance. Older designs often refer to having "two filter" or "four filter" methods. Here is a post by Monte that discusses that subject. See also "Ground Filtering" in the DFX Engineering Report by Mark Rowan.

Back in 2014 I got a smoking deal on a like new used White's V3i with over a year of remaining warranty. It was my third after the original Vision and then later a V3i. I quickly found a platinum ring that almost paid for what I had into it, but unfortunately I got busy on other things and when the warranty was about up I sold it. Well, I have regretted it ever since. The V3i is a unique detector that represents the end result of a design philosophy that I do not think we will see exceeded. You have programmable access to nearly every function that exists in a metal detector along with amazing control over the audio and visual interface. The bright, sharp, colorful screen has never been done better on any other model in the ensuing years. Owning the V3i is very much like owning a "design your own detector kit". I am very much not a person to have nostalgic feelings about metal detectors or to ever hang on to any very long. However, the V3i is in a class of its own in many ways and I decided if there was ever a detector I should just buy and keep it is the V3i. That being the case I decided to get a brand new one from the factory. I may very well end up using this detector to shoot a series of instructional videos about general metal detecting theory and technique. The functions and colorful screen can be used to well illustrate almost anything I can think of when it comes to metal detectors and how they work. Don't be holding your breath however - me getting around to doing some things like finishing the ATX Strip and Rebuild can sometimes take years! I finally had reason to drive west to visit family recently, and made a swing by White's a part of that drive. I contacted forum member Tom Boykin (tboykin) who works at White's to set up a good time for a meet and greet. And so it was I found myself heading for Sweet Home, Oregon! Click on photos for larger versions. Aerial view of White's facility.... White's sits across a bridge from the main of Sweet Home right on the banks for the beautiful South Santiam River.... Cross over the bridge and turn left and there is the sign... First thing you see entering the main office building is a little detector showroom... but the main attraction is a large display of old White's detectors and items found with them.... Here is the old BFO Nugget Master with dual meters. Ken White Sr. loved huge boxes, lots of knobs, and big or even multiple meters - I doubt ergonomic was even in his vocabulary! The big boxes were often empty with a little circuit board tucked in a corner. Next to the Nugget Master is an original type blue box Gold Master, part of the old T/R series. These are just collectors items folks so don't be tempted to buy one thinking you are getting a decent nugget detector - only the black box versions can be considered as modern detectors. The old blue box versions don't even ground balance. And a real sweetie, the Treasure Master! Anyway, I was running a tight schedule, arriving at Sweet Home at 11AM and heading on to Reno around 2:30 getting home near midnight. Tom was gracious enough to give me a tour of the facilities where I met faces both new and old, and he bought lunch to top it all off. Then I picked up my brand new V3i (which I really am going to keep) and hit the road for Reno. Tom is an engaging young man with infectious enthusiasm and we are lucky to have him on the forum. He is still relatively new to detecting so go easy on him. The fact is though it will be people like Tom that take metal detecting to the next generation. Thanks for the tour Tom! For those who have not been so lucky check out the White's Electronics Factory Tour Video. And finally, here is my new baby still waiting to make its first find...

With the versatility of the V3i I was wondering what settings I would have to make to set it up to emulate the MX Sport.... There are settings for the V3i to emulate the MXT, I have used them out of curiosity and found they work pretty well but my mode of choice is still stereo mixed mode.

What could a person expect to be the normal air test on a dime and nickel using the stock coin/jewelry program with the v3i and the stock 11" D2 coil? Thanks in advance

Recently bought a used V3i from a hunting buddy. He bought the V3 new and later updated to the V3i version. The machine is fairly clean and the 10" D2 appears to never been used. He bought two SEF 10 x 12" coils, one white and one black. I was very concerned about the lack of air test distances, but with a few reductions in settings the coils will be sufficient for while as long as I don't run multi-frequency and keep the tx boost off. Did the simple test to see if they were V rated and all failed and one will not ground balance while in multi-frequency. All this makes sense since he originally bought a V3 detector. Now I understand why he bought the SEF coils (he thought they would add depth). I originally bought the machine for only gold/jewelry hunting with the 22.5 frequency which will require a V coil if I run with high sensitivity settings.

I am looking for as much practical and technical info on the V3i's prospecting mode as possible. It is an area that is extremely lacking. I don't have much nugget shooting experience but I'm hoping to remedy that situation in the near future. I have done some with my MXT but I want to explore the potential of the V3i. If any of the White's tech info is available that would be great too. Thank's...

Let me start by saying I own 3 White's machines. I have had the V3i since 2010 with the 10" DD coil the 6x9 and the 4X6. It never has been a great depth machine for me, but I usually run the stock programs C&J usually I recently sent it to the White's factory for a tune up after poor air testing 6" on a Quarter and I was sure something was fishy. I got it back yesterday and the said two of the 3 coils were out of spec and they replaced them. They told me the coils are still good for use on the DFX, MXT but not the V3i. They also replaced 2 ribbon cables and the screen plastic total reset and calibration.Total cost with return shipping $252. and change, It was very reasonable. The only problem is it didn't change a thing , still poor depth performance in the air and on the ground. No target separation whatsoever, just total masking. I have a test garden and it only sees the quarter barely at 6". My Tesoro Outlaw finds everything in the garden no problem with the 8" coil. When I run custom programs from Magic and Fox it gets slightly better but not consistent. So it's up on Craigslist as I am no longer investing any more time and resources into it. White's service was great and the costs were minimal for the service rendered no issues with that. My other two White's machine are great!

Does anyone know if the White's multi frequency vlf detectors such as the VX3 and the V3i search coils have just one coil for the transmit and one coil for the receive or are there separate sets of transmit and receive coils in the coil housing for each frequency? thanks