Garrett Vortex VX9 In Need Of Update

[Steve Herschbach]

We now have several forum members that all have the Vortex. There has been a lot of pot stirring elsewhere online but I like a more dispassionate “just the facts please” type of discussion. I’m all for honest reporting but what gets termed as constructive criticism elsewhere is anything but that from what I have seen. Just a bunch of people who have never used the detector piling on. We try to do better here, so in the spirit of accurate reporting and constructive criticism, I think it is important for forum visitors to know that the overall consensus is that the new Garrett Vortex is in need of a update to fix several issues.

I have seen a lot of talk pointing fingers at the testers, implying they are real dummies for not seeing these things. As a former tester I can promise you that if you ever do it, a lot of what you report gets overlooked or ignored. If there are any issues here they lie ultimately with Garrett and Garrett alone in making the decision to release the Vortex to market. That is their call and their responsibility alone. So let’s leave the testers out of it here unless they are a forum member and wish to comment themselves.

As far as details, I will leave it to the forum members who own the detector to comment, if they choose. People who don’t own the machine, frankly, you have nothing to offer but second hand opinions so please keep that well in mind before you comment. Thanks.

So @abenson @IBMe @George Kinsey @Chase Goldman and anyone else who actually owns and is using a Vortex, what issues are you seeing? What updates would you like to see implemented? If the commentary is of the quality I am hoping it would be and as I would expect from members of this forum, then this thread will get passed on to Garrett as a feedback thread. With that in mind, extraneous non-productive comments by non-owners may be deleted at my discretion. If you have something constructive to say, please do, but let’s keep this respectful as if you are talking directly to the engineers involved…. because you very well might be. Thank you.

P.S. Videos by non-members are not needed here and will be deleted if posted. Just an FYI to know is that Iffy Signals is a member.

[abenson]

I know there are a lot of issues with the Vortex and many I have seen myself in the tests and hunts I've done. I basically told a few people I wasn't going to get in on the Garrett bashing and would wait for the update to come out. But honestly it does suck that Garrett put it out in the condition it's in. I would hold off on purchasing one until they have the issues worked out.

My Vortex charged in about 5 hours, but the charging cord the Vortex came with had a short, so I threw it away and used one I already had.

Multi Salt-I have witnessed the coin ID issues most people are talking about. What's weird is a Morgan Dollar acts differently than a Peace Dollar does. At least the ones I tested. Morgan seems to give an accurate ID in most frequencies, but the peace dollar is completely screwed up and in some frequencies is completely discriminated out. I've found over a dozen silver dollars at the particular beach I hunted in the video I did. So it's a little concerning that the Vortex is having issues with silver dollars.

When I first used the Vortex on the beach I thought it was strange that bottle cap reject and iron boundary was greyed out. If figured they had it preset high to take care of iron and bottle caps, turns out it's the opposite. (As designed so not needed)

I've haven't had any issues with my Vortex turning off or on randomly like some have reported.

Multi-I'm seeing the same issues with funky coin ID's in different frequencies as others are reporting, I haven't dived into it that much other than tested to see if my machine was also having issues with coin ID.

But my biggest concern is how the Vortex handles my high mineral dirt. It doesn't. Dime at 6" it calls it iron, iron separation is poor also on in ground tests. To put things in perspective, my Vanquish 340 walks circles around the Vortex in high mineral dirt. The SMF on the Vortex is simply not set up in the right configuration to handle high mineral dirt. Maybe a faster recovery option would help, I don't know. I'm hoping an update will change things but I doubt it.

Just thought of another issue I experienced and that is depth scale and VDI not registering on deeper targets. The update on this may fix the issue I'm having in my dirt calling deep coins iron.

Adding as I think off them-No VDI scale when trying to notch out certain VDI's. Total shot in the dark when doing this. Detector doesn't save last settings when turned off, at least give us some custom program save options so we don't lose our settings when the machine is turned off.

[Steve Herschbach]

5 hours ago, abenson said:

at least give us some custom program save options so we don't lose our settings when the machine is turned off.

This is not doing what you want?

Custom Mode - Settings programmed by the user are retained when the detector is switched off. Factory preset is Standard Mode.

[Jeff McClendon]

Thanks Steve and Andy for providing an opportunity for calm, factual, and not “in your face” assessments of the current state of the Vortex. I have an extended family member that was looking for a detector during this holiday season. This makes it easy for me to tell them that going in another direction might be wise at the moment.

Mineralized ground handling is super important to my relative due to where they live. Andy’s assessment makes me wonder if the Vortex series will ever be able to handle really iron mineralized ground. Apex didn’t handle it well either before or after the update.

 

[IBMe]

I am working on a response.

Thin coin and fast mode have a half-notch feature which gives half audio on the notch.

Very useful because you don’t get dead space on the notch.

Hover, you can’t do much with it because those aren’t saved when turned off.

Half notch only works on those modes.

The settings really need to be saved. You want to take a little break, move to another area, …

[abenson]

1 hour ago, Steve Herschbach said:

This is not doing what you want?

Custom Mode - Settings programmed by the user are retained when the detector is switched off. Factory preset is Standard Mode.

I'm talking about when you're just in a regular mode and have notched out stuff and then turn the machine off. When you turn it back on the notch pattern is lost.

[IBMe]

I use zero mode and no filters, and dig by size and not ID. I do check ID before I dig, but if it’s high tone and high conductor ID, I don’t pay attention to detail.  
(If you have X-Terra Pro or Nokta Ultra, that’s the way to play the game)

In use right now, I don’t have any problems, and it works great. But the way I use it doesn’t test anything.
Over time, I need a good ID.

In zero mode and no filters, turning iron audio on replaces the iron buzz with low-mid tone. Works in multi but not in single frequency.

Today, using MS-3 headphones, it took me a while to realize I basically had a dead machine.
I would be interested in knowing if you, abenson, had headphones on when “how the Vortex handles my high mineral dirt.” That sounds like how mine behaves when I had headphones on.

I thought I had a dead machine and was packing it in.
When I turned the headphones off, the machine came back to life.
If no one else is having problems with the headphones, then I have bad headphones.

The overall scheme?
Doesn’t matter to me, but …
In single frequency, you have 20 notches for 0 to 99.
Three bar, top bar; 20 notches for 0 to 39.
Three bar, middle bar, 20 notches for 40 to 99.
Most schemes you have a constant ID-notch ratio.
Recipe for disaster?

[IBMe]

1 hour ago, Steve Herschbach said:

This is not doing what you want?

Custom Mode - Settings programmed by the user are retained when the detector is switched off. Factory preset is Standard Mode.

After thinking about it, settings absolutely need to be saved.
The instruction for using headphones is, turn the machine off, push button on headphones, turn machine on.
Currently, it’s mandatory to lose your settings to use headphones.

[Steve Herschbach]

What I was asking was whether or not Custom Mode can be programmed to do what you guys want, so the settings would be saved. I get that the other modes do not save. I am assuming by your answers you can’t get Custom Mode set up as a direct replacement for the other modes.