All Roads Lead To First Texas

[STA]

10 hours ago, Jeff McClendon said:

Thanks Phrunt. For the price and since I know the F19 platform really well, there won't be any surprises and I won't be disappointed. I am not asking anything of the F19. I just love that platform and have been looking for a new one with the 10x5" coil for a while at a rock bottom price.

Personally, the Legend with its 9.5X5" coil seriously will out perform it head to head using their discrimination/multi tone modes with the Legend on Multi or 20 kHz.

However, switching the F19 to its live threshold based all metal mode is a one of a kind experience. Like Steve said, I can crank it up to 99% sensitivity and it will just effortlessly detect in bad EMI and 19 kHz is just about the perfect transmit frequency for my sketchy ground. It even competes well with the ORX and Deus 2 in Mono set on similar frequencies.  Experiencing that live threshold is an experience I miss and one that people who have only owned the newer selectable single frequency and SMF detectors with hybrid prospecting modes and reference thresholds have no concept of. 

Until a couple weeks ago the f-19 with the 5X10 was still a useful tool. Sad to see what has become of the company, and what it is probably now worth as a used machine, but that thing works as well as the day it was new. The only thing I did not like about that is the batteries it takes.

A couple weeks ago, I got a Legend. It was a process learning how to use it, but I could not go back now. You can see I have a detector for almost everything, now it is hard to see what a Legend could not be made to do. Despite the happiness with the new detector, I am a little sad about that.

[Steve Herschbach]

13 hours ago, kac said:

Late chiming in here, it is never good to compete with your resellers. Seems like they want to maximize profits but the downside of selling direct is you have to hit the pavement and start peddling product. That can be a daunting and expensive task when your resellers would be doing that for you on a much larger scale. Customer support is the next issue as when you have no dealers representing and assisting products then thats the other task that is needed.

End of the day it's better to leave the footwork to the dealers and concentrate on designing and building products.

The reality is the there are a few excellent dealers. That's true. But the majority are order takers and no stock drop shippers, that know less than many of their customers, who compete from their basement with cutthroat pricing. Their idea of customer support is “call the manufacturer.” The idea that all dealers are knowledgeable people educating their customers and actually generating sales is laughable in this day and age. The vast majority of us have no decent dealer nearby, at best a big box store. Most buyers as a result get on the internet, Google around, find a deal, and place the order. No interaction at all. I was one of those very good dealers and appreciate the sentiment, but I also as a result have a very low opinion of what passes as a dealer these days. It’s no wonder the manufacturers are axing them or bypassing them, as they are simply leeches on the profit. Sadly, the good dealers will get caught in the grinder also.

[kac]

That is true. It still becomes an issue when someone is shopping for a detector they have limited scope on comparing different machines. Someone new is more likely to then just snag some cheap pos from ebay or amazon as they have little guidance. YouTube is laughable with all the bs hype about different machines and apple and oranges comparisons.

[phrunt]

5 minutes ago, kac said:

That is true. It still becomes an issue when someone is shopping for a detector they have limited scope on comparing different machines. Someone new is more likely to then just snag some cheap pos from ebay or amazon as they have little guidance. YouTube is laughable with all the bs hype about different machines and apple and oranges comparisons.

Unless a multi-line dealer the chances of getting the "correct" advice is minimal, as they're going to sell you what they have, not necessarily the best for your requirements.

[Steve Herschbach]

16 minutes ago, kac said:

That is true. It still becomes an issue when someone is shopping for a detector they have limited scope on comparing different machines. Someone new is more likely to then just snag some cheap pos from ebay or amazon as they have little guidance. YouTube is laughable with all the bs hype about different machines and apple and oranges comparisons.

Well, like they say, a fool and his money are soon parted. Our entire system is designed to get you to give your money to somebody else. You either have some sense in these things or you will always be poor. Economic Darwinism at work. Luckily it's always those other people who are falling for the nonsense, because we are all smarter than that, right.