Not Much Interest In USA Units Lately

[bigtim1973]

I have noticed that the majority or new comparison between units all seemed to be more geared toward Nokta, Minelab and XP. 

Every now and then mentions the Apex but overall for general detecting....I am not seeing much interest in anything from First Texas and Garrett here in the comparison threads and elsewhere. 

Not even older flagship models compared to newer units or anyone mentioning buying an older flagship USA model. 

I do believe the Gold machines fall into a different class like the Fisher gold bug and Maybe the Garrett gold units. 

But for general relic, coin and jewelry hunting on either inland or on beaches......there just does not seem to be any interest recently from the American companies. 

 

 

 

 

[The Pest]

Just My 2 Bits.... I myself just acquired an MXT-E and recently posted about it... I don't know that An older flagship detector could compare fairly... It's like a race between a Dual Engine Tractor Pull Tractor... and  a Porsche... They just aren't in the same class.... I haven't toed in on a newer unit yet.... I like the Nokta Simplex best at the moment... But the technology is still evolving way too fast... In My Opinion.... They're gonna hit a technology wall... and it's gonna burn out...  Garrett and 1st Texas may just be hanging tight for the minute... And waiting to see how it's gonna spin... I'm not in a hurry by a long shot.... There's plenty of old and new Aluminum targets to be found... I have plenty of Old Flag Ship detectors I'm Happy with.... And I quite honestly don't like all this GPS stuff the Non US companies are incorporating... Every time you do an update.... the thing is trying to share your GPS data with it's makers... It's nobody's business where I found A silver quarter... Unless I choose to share the adventure... But that's been more than 2 bits.... The xtra 3 1/2 were on the house.... ☺️ 

[bigtim1973]

Yes that mxt was my favorite whites machine. 

And being a machine no longer made......it can hang with some of the big dogs. 

I had some good times with the one I had. A very good relic and coin unit. 

Never tried it on the gold as I do not live anywhere near gold foelds.

[GB_Amateur]

In the IB/VLF space you need to make a competitive multifrequency detector to get much notice.  (The Garrett Apex didn't seem to make the 'competitive' grade.)  There's still hope for Garrett anyway, but as time ticks by others like Quest (their MF entries still vaporware as far as consumers are concerned, though, so TBD) are beating them to the punch.  At least Garrett arrived in time with their Axiom dry-land PI, giving Minelab enough concern to drastically drop the price here in the USA on their GPX6000.

[Dean Stone]

I have used alot of detectors, and over the last 20 years i have found more rings and money with the MXT than any other detector i have used. I have two MXTs now and if i find a good deal on a used one i will buy it. The last ones i am trying now is the Anfibio, Vanquish 450, I had a F75 and sold it before i used it. Now i am looking to get another one. As long as i detector i will always have a MXT. I do alot of treading and selling, that is fun for me.

[Steve Herschbach]

White's is long gone as is Tesoro so their models don't matter anymore going forward. All we have left is First Texas (Fisher, Bounty Hunter, Teknetics) and Garrett.

In the tech world you either innovate with a constant stream of "new" products, or you get left behind. First Texas seems out of the running at this point. Garrett is doing well with the Axiom, and the Apex fits for what it was intended for, but it is quite obvious their almost their entire VLF lineup needs to be refreshed, and like last year. They simply are not part of any discussion. I will point out that the online world is a bit at odds with reality. Go to any large detector club meeting or hunt here in the U.S. and you will see plenty of Garrett product. But that will change if they don't get with the program soon. GTI 2500 as flagship after over 20 years - embarrassing.

[bigtim1973]

Garrett does have a job opening for an engineer position.

They need to drag someone from Europe or Turkey over and make things happen for them again. 

 

[Chase Goldman]

1 hour ago, bigtim1973 said:

Garrett does have a job opening for an engineer position.

They need to drag someone from Europe or Turkey over and make things happen for them again. 

 

Plenty of engineering talent right here in the USA.  Problem is so many other industries are sucking up engineers from the shrinking talent pool (yes there are fewer people entering into college engineering programs every year) and there is no way someone like Garrett can compete compensation-wise for that talent since we are talking basically about designing toys (that’s right people, toys) vs. multibillion dollar behemoths like Google, Amazon, Meta, Tesla, etc. that are working on deploying the real Skynet from the Terminator series. Foreign talent is not necessarily better and frankly someone is not going to come over here just to work for Garrett when they can work for someone else I just mentioned.

Someone earlier talked about eventually hitting a technology wall.  Guess what, we basically hit that wall years ago.  Induction Balance technology is effective but an ancient and crude way to ascertain the nature of a buried piece of metal and now we are just squeezing drops of performance out of it by upping processing speed (where do you go once you can process a signal as fast as a human can swing a coil) and doing some real backflips with signal processing technology and simultaneous frequencies.  But we’re just polishing a cannonball at this point, not really innovating.  Furthermore, the noise floor continues to rise with the proliferation of wireless communication and control technology that it is becoming harder for designers to cut through the EMI similar to how light polllution and SpaceX  satellite constellations are ruining visual astronomy.

As Steve says, now that Axiom is out there and appears to be successful, Garret (the only viable US detecting manufacturer with an active R&D presence) needs to pivot back and build off APEX which was a low risk way for Garrett to dip their toe into SMF (set expectations low by introducing it as part of your entry level ACE lineup) and refresh their mid and flagship level offerings.  

Also, where is the hobby headed?  Relics and gold are not replenished and coinage and jewelry  are disappearing as we are now content to buy stuff with our phones and wear non-metallic silicone SafeRingz instead of gold wedding bands.

Anyway, it’s pretty obvious why the US is lagging in VLF detector innovation.  So the question is whether it’s too late for Garrett to get back into the game.  FT is content to continue serving up warmed over pink and purple variants of detectors they designed more than 10 to 15 years earlier.

I’m a firm believer that location vice detector technology is key to growing the hobby or facilitating individual success.  Harnessing technology and AI to facilitate site research and access as well as for assuring swing coverage my do more to reinvigorate the hobby than incremental improvements in induction balance detector technology (though introducing machine learning into the detector technology mix might be the next game changer).

My nonsensical ramblings, FWIW.

[phrunt]

Brands out of Europe often get forgotten such as Rutus, they've made detectors far beyond any US manufacturer and they rarely get talked about, that indeed shows how far the US manufacturers are behind the ball when brands in other parts of the world although far superior aren't even mentioned.    If Garrett came out with the Rutus Atrex people would be super impressed.

This towers over anything a US manufacturer has released in the VLF space lately.

It really does demonstrate how far behind US manufacturers are though when a detector this good is not even on many peoples radar in the US.

[Chase Goldman]

34 minutes ago, phrunt said:

It really does demonstrate how far behind US manufacturers are though when a detector this good is not even on many peoples radar in the US.

Not sure what one has to do with the other.  It just shows that Rutus doesn’t have a strong marketing presence with detectorists in the US vs. XP, Minelab, Nokta, and Quest despite having a great design.  All of these non-US manufacturers have products that far exceed anything the US has to offer at this point.  I don’t think the US manufactures are oblivious to products like the Atrex, just as they know they are getting their clock cleaned by the other better known Non-US players.

Also, as seen in this thread, a not-insignificant contingent of folks in the US are willing to continue to cling to their Classic MXTs, AT Pros, and F75s at this point, despite the demonstrated performance and features gains of these foreign detectors.  Not sure what to do with that but I think it has something to do with the fact that they still work and find plenty of targets and the users are intimately familiar with their quirks and secrets (knowing your detector well generally trumps superior tech in the hands of a newbie).  And like I said previously, these “significant” advances in detector tech, in reality, are only incremental and really only marginally increase finds in the grand scheme of things.  The key being not technology so much as finding and gaining access to the shrinking number of sites that produce finds.