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Some folks here may find this interesting, I certainly did! Testing my equinox 800 in my home test garden today, ground not high on mineralisation, but full of iron, old rusty nails etc. Had a silver UK sixpence 1930's buried only about 4/5 inches deep iron nails below and all around. (Difficult target) Imagine a clock face, I'm sweeping from 12 o'clock to 6 o'clock , good 2 way tone, no problem, now sweeping from 3 o'clock to 9 o'clock, 1 way signal, one tone only sweeping from left to right (from 3 o'clock back to 9 o'clock) Here's the interesting discovery reference ground balance, on my test garden there's so much iron getting a true GB is impossible, when I do try to auto GB it jumps up to the high 90's! However most of my permissions here in the UK read a GB in the mid 40's to the mid 50's so generally that's where I leave my GB most of the time. Ok GB set at 50, one way target from 3 o'clock to 9 o'clock, sweeping from 3 back to 9 gives me a one way tone. Increasing the GB to 90 gave the opposite, still a one way tone, but in reverse ,now sweeping from 9 back to 3,, still a good 2 way tone sweeping from 12 to 6! Lowering the GB to 75, amazing, perfect 2 way tone, 3 to 9,, and 9 to 3. Just thought I would share this as I found the results very interesting! (GB set at 0 gave no tone whatsoever from 3 o'clock to 9 o'clock) Program used field 2 , 50 tones, multi, discrimination -9/+1, iron bias 1, stock 11" coil, sensitivity (tried 17/21 not a great deal of difference) Regards Dave. H

Since the Equinox first came out and the Facebook groups started up covering it, there have been several examples of settings that are posted and stated as absolutes. One that warrants some discussion is GROUND BALANCE. The common response to the question “Should I Ground Balance my Equinox?” is “No, leave it at preset as there is no need to ground balance it since it is running Multi Frequency.” Before we accept that statement as gospel, let’s step back and ask a basic question which is if there was no need to use the function, why would Minelab had included it in the first place? The answer is they would not have and it is there for a reason which is to address the adverse effect caused by mineralized ground. The more mineralized the ground is at your selected search site the more the performance will be impacted. Remember, the factory preset for this is “0” yet it offers an adjustment range from “-9” to “99” So, do you know how mineralized the ground is in your area or the sites you frequent? Do you know that mineralization levels can change dramatically in a short distance? A good example is an older house where the front yard can be mild in terms of mineralization while the backyard can be severe due to coal cinders and other stuff in the ground. On a site such as this, settings that would be ideal for the front of the house might be mediocre at best in the backyard and ground balance may be the setting that corrects that issue. In the area around where I live in Michigan, the Ground Balance registers between 55 and 75 on the Equinox. I do extensive testing on actual targets before recovering them (great use for poker chips) so I can see if making a change or changes will improve performance and I have found that performing a Ground Balance at my sites makes a noticeable difference over leaving it at preset. In fact, several times I have found that a deeper target either is not detected or mis-identified with the GB at preset compared to setting it correctly. It also runs quieter which helps pick out those marginal signals. So, I could make the absolute statement that “Ground Balancing is always required” but is that really an accurate statement for any location worldwide? This past weekend my wife and I attended a hunt (rally) in central Pennsylvania and we stopped at an old school (circa 1924) on the way to the hunt site. I Ground Balanced the Equinox 800 and the site registered between 14 and 18 . . . much different than my home sites. I searched for a few minutes and got a good, deep signal. I reset the GB to “0” and checked the target . . .it was still discernible. So, in this case, adjusting the GB off of the preset did not buy me anything. The hunt site was a bit different and in some areas, the ground registered 50 or higher. In those cases, coins on edge were not as clear with the GB at preset (0) as compared to setting the unit for the ground conditions. I used the Equinox on my last trip to England and rarely saw GB values above 20 in any of the fields we visited. The takeaway from this is that there is no “one rule fits all conditions” as site conditions can and do change which will cause you to reassess your settings and make the adjustments needed to compensate for those changes. If you want to get an accurate answer to the question “Should I Ground Balance my Equinox?”, do the following . . . . 1) Do an Auto Ground Balance at your site to see what the ground mineralization is. 2) Find and mark a deep target. 3) Sweep over it with the GB set at “0” (preset) and then again with it at the value you found when you GB’ed the Equinox. If you get a cleaner, stronger signal with the GB set off preset, you have your answer for that location. If not, leave it at preset and reap the rewards. But avoid saying it always should be left at Preset based on an Internet forum or Facebook post as the person that made the post might be searching sites totally different than what you are. Dial the detector in to YOUR sites and YOUR targets . . . you will always do better than simply taking advice that might be fine in one area and not another and usually that other area will be yours. Hope this helps . . . . . remember, the answer to virtually any question that pertains to setting a metal detector is almost always "IT DEPENDS" as conditions vary so greatly!

I have never used a detector that has such a problem with a coil cover filling full of dirt and sand.Got tired of having to remove coil cover to clean.It's really bad at the beach, if I'm working just above waterline and a wave comes in and fills my cover full of water and sand, even though it's only a few ounces it feels like 5 lbs. And it's nice after hunting dry sand and putting it in the back of my Jeep and watch sand pour out. Had enough of that. Drilled some 9/64" drain holes in the cover, be sure you take it off the loop first. It will help a lot. Had very little sand after a beach hunt, usually the coil is packed.Since I took this pic, I have drilled 1/4" holes at 12:00 and 6:00, use those for flushing, put the hose to the top hole and let it flow out of the bottom. Don't run the water full blast, unless you wanna get wet.

Hi friends! So I’ve had my equinox 800 for about a year now but have yet to try prospecting with it. I live in Maine and find some pickers while dredging but wondering if the equinox would pick up gold hidden in bedrock cracks and crevices?

Testing out the Jones beach Land program...

Hi Folks I have been busy making quite a few finds recently. After more than a year with the Equinox, it continues to impress me with it's capabilities. Some of my recent finds include some early 1630's Kettle Points and Turtle Effigy, Spanish Silver, KG's and more. I even have had it scuba diving. Unfortunately I wasn't impressed with the volume with the Grey Ghost headphones. I have a new pair of Tony Eisenhower headphones ready to try out with the hopes that the volume is better. We shall see. HH Everyone...

I was having a relatively slow morning detecting at La Jolla Shores Beach in San Diego today, about $1 in clad and a euro coin when a young woman came up asking for help finding a ring. She was frantic and her husband was second guessing, saying it must be at home and asking when was the last time she saw it? She kept insisting it was here right here, next to the seawall. With just a couple swipes of my Equinox 800/15" coil I had it in the scoop. She was ecstatic and gave me a big hug. I've always dreamt of finding a big expensive engagement ring whilst detecting. I've gotten a few gold bands but nothing like this! I obviously didn't get to keep it, but it seemed to bring some good karma to the day and I found two large silver rings shortly afterward. She insisted on getting my info and address so I might be getting a reward or thank you letter later. Here's a couple pics of the expensive ring, the happy owner and the two silvers I got afterward.

Need help. My equinox 600 doesn't change discrimination patterns when I switch detect modes. I am always in all metal mode. My boyfriend has the same machine and his changes with each mode...he doesn't know why mine does not. I can't figure it out...help please.

Editor note: split from https://www.detectorprospector.com/forums/topic/9945-my-salt-water-report-card/ I agree with ya on some of your points and grades. After a year of using the Equinox, I can give a fair assessment on where it ranks and how it compares to other detectors for the uses that I do. If I were solely a beach hunter, I would personally feel more confident with a CTX 3030. I personally feel it has more depth to it in that arena. Even in freshwater, I put a good season of water hunting in with the CTX and all last year with the Nox. I found more rings last year with the Nox but I also found triple as much small junk that slowed me down...stuff that fell through the scoop, and or just disappeared. This alone has me wanting to snag a good used CTX. On saltwater beach...this is an even stronger feeling of favoring the CTX to me. I personally didn't mind the weight of the unit. I find the screen is easier to see on the Nox, particularly in direct sun light. I even like the feel of the Nox. I just feel from what I see, that the 3030 has more muscle to it in that area. I can't ever remember having a target that disappeared/vanished on me once I scooped a hole while hunting with the CTX. I had some I almost gave up on cause they were so deep though. The Nox will do the Houdini act in salt sand and in dirt....it doesn't like open holes at all. When it comes to hunting in mineralized soil and coin/relic hunting back home...this changes big time. Even though the CTX is revered as a great coin machine, it is handicapped a lot by red dirt. The Nox runs circles around it there. Like night and day difference. Hunting in iron...same thing. Heavily favored to the Nox. This leaves me in a split mood. Most of my summer hunting IS in the water for jewelry, albeit freshwater. The Nox will find the same rings as the CTX...but it also wants to lock onto those small pieces of crap that fall through the scoop. I need to figure out a way to have both and hope the wife doesn't find out ?

This is my Equinox 800 in the folded position, and in its tennis racket bag. Its really the ultimate in portability, I just flip up the coil, press the lock button on the folding mechanism and fold the detector in,where it will lock in place folded.the length folded is 24",and its at the height that I use it at. The folding gizmo weighs 5 oz. and doesn't add any noticeable weight, though it can be easily offset. The bag has a zippered compartment for my shovel and the aptX headphones are in a net bag on the front. I can wear it like a backpack. I have the 600 set up the same way with its own racket bag.

Been out awhile end of year at school has kept me busy. Thought it would be interesting to hear everyone’s favorite go to. I primarily hit coal mining ghost towns and run Nox 600 Field 1 and 2 all metal 50 tone sens 16-20 recovery 3 IB-0 I try new setups but end up back to where I started, some days are better than others. hope everyone is getting out and enjoying!

Received the Equinox Handbook a few days ago and modified Park1 on my E600 per the Cherry Picking program. Local parks dry out this time of the year plus we had below-average rainfall. One park dates from 1920, is one city block, and surrounded by power lines on all sides. Yet the detector was completely quiet but I Noise Cancelled out of habit. I found a Sargent key, an eye glasses temple, 2 pennies and assorted junk. The Cherry Picking settings will prove very useful as dried out parks become the norm. There is a modified Beach1 for land that might be interesting to try as well. The Handbook generated a sale. From Doc's detecting supplies I bought the cover for the control pod and cuff. Docs is mentioned in the list of vendors in the Handbook.

Been working an old railroad freight yard. It is covered in trash, mainly iron. I cannot find an area clean enough to ground balance, I just run at 0. I've found a few railroad tags and fell in love with them. The rarest local history I've ever found. I want to find more. I've dug a few coins from the site, but they are few and far between and come up in very poor condition. I want to concentrate on the tags. They are made of brass and range in size from 1X2 to 2X3 inches and are 1/8 thick. What is the best detect mode to use for these conditions? Any recommendations on settings?

Just spent a couple days hunting a hopefully not a once in a lifetime site!!!! A 70’s built cafeteria building at an old 1915 school was just torn down and the foundation removed. A roughly 60’x100’ area that was absolutely loaded with coins. Hands down my most productive opportunity to date! Was running the 600 in park1 w 50 tones, iron on and stock recovery and iron bias. Sensitivity started at 20 but with the targets being shallow I backed down to 16-18 and it seemed to behave a little better with the shallow iron and corroded conduit littering the site. Hoping to get back Monday or Tuesday to go back over it again as I’m sure there is still some targets hiding. I have only had the EQX a few weeks, coming from Tesoros, Explorer2 and a MakroMK, I really enjoy the audio, much more pleasant to listen to than the Makro at least. Seems to handle the iron very well too! Grand total was 1slq, 1 Washington, 1rosie, 4mercs, 6buffaloes, 2 war nickels, 1891indian, handful of early jeffersons, 60+ wheats, a copper ring and a tiny silver ring and charm. The majority of the silver was super corroded, I assume from the lime in the concrete, and the two war nickels rang up above normal. Strangely enough the buffalo nickels were the least corroded of all the coins. Fortunately the SLQ was off the edge from where the concrete had been and wasn’t corroded at all! Still reeling from the experience, and still sore too!! LOL. Thanks for looking

Hey guys. Back in December 2018 I deliberately bought the Equinox 800. A very functional device. Until today I didn't notice that something was "missing" on the control box, it is the "Equlnox 800" symbol as you can see it in above "Settings" between plus and minus. Does someone know why? Any reasons for that?

Has anyone managed to use gold mode on wet sand. I love VCO audio but now only do my local beaches here in the UK. Whenever I’ve tried the Nox 800 just howls like a banshee whatever I try ground balance or sensitivity wise. My beaches are very benign and in beach 1 GB can be left on zero. Or is it that the wet sand is just too conductive for this mode?

I was able to get back to the CW site today and was able to pick up a couple of first's for me from this place. The Great Coat button and the A button have eluded me since I started hunting the place. Finally the button god had mercy and bestowed it's graces upon me twice. I was hunting an area that I had gone over before, but, this time I went east to west instead of north to south. All the targets were a dig me, no doubt about it hits( I suck) just flat missed them. The bottom button is a 1 piece and looks older than the others, I cannot tell if there's anything on it or not. My settings were.... Nox 800 Park 2 Recovery 5 Iron bias 2 Sens 19 Auto GB No disc 2 Tones Tone break from-9 to +8 11" coil

I was able to get back to my honey hole again today. I'm in an unusual situation in life that allows me to hunt more than I normally would, so.......Off I go to try and round up a few more relics while I can. The morning just sucked!! I dug nothing but trash with an occasional percussion cap and a piece of lead here and there. I told myself I would move to another spot and if the trend continued, I was outta there. Fortunately I was able to meander to a hot spot that finally started to give it up and was able to salvage the day. Most of the finds came within the last couple of hours of the hunt and I left feeling very gratified and tired!!! I scored what I believe are 2 Confederate ringtail Sharps, but, I could be mistaken. I'm loving the Nox for this kind of hunting. Let me know if these posts are getting old ? My settings were: Nox 800 Park 2 11" coil GB 0 Recovery 6 Iron Bias 0 2 Tones Tone break -9 to +8 Sens 21 Disc -9 to 0

Today is my 50th anniversary. My Equinox 800 is my wife’s gift to me. Tomorrow we brave the snow and head to Lake Tahoe to celebrate. As I get prepared for my first hunt, I have been repeatedly reminded to stick to the default modes. I plan to do just that. However, my technical side has a curiosity of its own. It is my understanding that the power of the transmitted field is fixed by battery voltage. Beside changing frequency from Multi to individual frequencies, which settings impact coil transmission properties? On the reception side, which settings impact signal reception qualities? Do any settings impact both transmission and reception? Do any settings work together in the normal course of tuning and balancing for ground and trash conditions? For example, does a change in "Recovery Speed" setting change equally both the number of transmissions and receptions or is processing done only on the reception side? Sensitivity? Iron bias? What I am unable to find in documentation is a basic guide to all settings affecting transmission only; receiver only; both. I am enjoying the reading, but there are a lot of places for information to hide. So I apologize if this information is easily found by most, but since I may be near information saturation, I could have easily skimmed by it. Thanks, Curtis

Hello, I've been using the machine for a couple of months now with some good results. I've been mainly hunting in Park 2 and Field 2 modes, even though under certain conditions they produce additional noise. For now, I would not like to modify any of the factory presets in any mode. I've been staying away from park 1 because of the high iron bias setup as it can truly mask some good targets in trashy conditions. However, the detector is really quiet in Park 1 and if you have a signal, it is usually something decent. Field 1 on the other hand has 2 tones and 0 iron bias. I've been wondering if anyone here has any experience using Field 1 in the field ? Is it still quiet, even though the iron bias is set to 0? Would be great if anyone could share an opinion on Field 1 mode. Regards, Igor

I was able to get back to my 1850's site early this morning for an all day hunt. First half of the day was slow, only a couple of trouser buttons, a percussion cap and some lead. The latter half of the day finally started to get a bit more exciting with 4 buttons, more percussion caps and some misc, pieces of flat brass debris and more lead. Running my Nox as follows. 11" coil 2-tones recovery 6 iron bias 0 tone break at -9 to +9 sens 23 Park 1

i used Dirt Fishing Biil S. program on P1 and like it a lot. I want to do the same to P2 but can't figure out how to convert P2 default 50 tone to 5 tone. In P1 it was already 5 tone so i only had change things around. in P2 i can't seem to find out how to change the 50 tone to 5 tone. I just can't deal with 50 tones trying to learn this machine. thanks in advance.

Finally go the video finished of comparing equinox 800 to the gold monster 1000 on in-situ targets in the field. This is my no mean the comprehensive review as im sure the settings on the equinox could be tweaked more produce even better results. But from what i saw on my ground they were vary evenly matched. The gold monster seemed to pop a little harder on the targets, but the equinox still hit all the targets the gm1000 hit. Since i detect mainly creeks the equinox has a leg up since its water proof and i dont have to worry about it getting wet or falling in the creek. Hope you guys enjoy the video and ill take more footage as i work this little patch.

The user profile button can be used to quickly shift to other settings. I wish Minelab would have given us option to De- globalize the settings we wanted to do. Like sensitivity. Sure would be a good OPTIONAL update to put together and offer folks. For EQx 800 model only suggested. Here is a suggestion I would like to see if possible to do. Would be good for both Eqx 600 and 800 models. Would be nice if I could have detector in a detect mode. And could have option to hit one key or a couple keys and the entire detect mode (currently in) all settings would sequentially be displayed to user with the corresponding menu icon (be it normal or advanced) shown as settings are cycled. Instead of a person having to go and double check when they turn on their detector. PS I guarantee some folks have used EQX with higher iron bias while detecting than they wanted to use,. Accidentally. My suggestion if possible would cut down on this error. Another recommendation to do if possible - apply to both 600 and 800 units. Can a way be devised where say a person is more or less a dedicated blue tooth headphone user. Where blue tooth is where Nox goes first searching instead of wi stream. Some time is wasted by folks waiting for Nox to get to blue tooth search the way it is. So basically allow which one (Wi stream or blue tooth) to be the first one searched for for a user. Again another creature comfort Minelab. And the 600 model I am assuming does search for Wi stream first. Someone correct me I am wrong. 600 model doesn’t even come with Wi stream module so it sure should be default set to look for Bluetooth first I think if nothing else. Oh yeah I’ve used EQX 800 a lot. There are things I notice that can be improved upon (for a digitally updatable) unit. While the cogs are still turning in my head.lol Here’s another update recommendation. Imo the sp reset is really useless when one thinks about it. Yeah it has a function. But a person can reset the whole detector and get by. So, it would be nice if a user could set up a detect mode with settings. And save. And by doing a sp reset these settings would be reverted back to by detector. Much more practical. In the field a person may change settings on the fly. And instead of having to remember what they changed in the detect mode they are using they could do a sp reset for the detect mode in question and restore their personal settings for a particular detect mode. Granted doing a full reset FP would reset detector to factory detect mode settings thus overriding personal settings set prior. Backlight on both 600 and 800 should default to OFF when unit is powered down. The way it is it stays at whatever setting it was when powered off. So a user may have backlight on during daytime after nighttime use and not even realize and waste battery power. Yeah I know some may think this is merely idiot proofing the detector moreso. I don’t see it that way at all. I see it as this detector has the capability to be more user friendly and maybe just save a user some time.