Available to field questions on the XP Deus . . . . . . :help:

[Andy Sabisch]

I've had several people contact me about the new XP Deus to ask questions about features or performance in certain applications. I've had the opportunity to spend a good deal of time with it throughout the Southeast and up into Virginia and Maryland trying it in different soil conditions and for different types of hunting.

I believe that there will be an XP Deus forum in the offering but in the meantime, if anyone has any questions on the detector, feel free to post them and I will see if I can provide some information that others can benefit from as well . . . . .

The Deus is a detector that really gets the adrenalin pumping and offers features that while available in other tech-areas, had not found their way to the detector industry . . . . . as you look at the detector and the underlying design, one can see how versatile and flexible a digital platform can really be.

Again, let me know if there are any questions you might have or photos that you might find of interest.

Andy Sabisch

 

[D&P-OR]

Andy-----You "wrote the book" on the Etrac!------Is this XP Deus detector as good as the Etrac in heavily mineralized soil?------Main question is, how is the depth & target I.D. on the Deus compared to the Etrac (in mineralized areas)?-----------Thanks, Del

 

[Andy Sabisch]

Del,

Good to hear from you . . . . . hope things are going well on your side of the country . . . .

Before getting into the "Depth" question, I need to say that there is often more to finding more in heavily hunted sites than simply more depth . . . . there's no doubt that you need to be able to reach down to deeply buried targets if they are there but often, there are some killer finds at depths that make one wonder how they could have been missed for more than 40 years of being passed over. Target masking due to adjacent targets, the orientation of the target, the composition of the target . . . . they all play a factor in what any detector will or will not find.

The Deus is an example of where a different circuit combined with a different coil design can unlock finds in areas that have become barren with other detectors.

What I have been trying to do is search defined areas (marked with kite string) at sites that I know I and others have hunted before. Then each signals is marked and logged . . . and then compared to other detectors to see what they responded with or if there were notable differences . . . . . . and so, the $64,000 question - did the Deus find targets that the E-Trac did not or hit them harder?

I have to say that as I have gained experience with the Deus and learned what specific adjustments do or don't do in specific applications and in specific ground conditions that there have been targets (keepers) that the Deus has located that the E-Trac (and other detectors) struggled with even knowing there was a target present.

The target ID has some quirks that I am still working to define so that I can communicate them in a manner that can be applied consistently across the country . . . . . . Some deeper targets appear to shift the target ID values which them correct themselves when the signal is removed from the hole . . . . . but there are other factors that may be used to determine if a target is worth digging or not.

Over the years I have found certain detectors seem to see the ground and targets therein differently than other detectors and this allows them to locate targets in areas that most have written off and price is not always the deciding factor. The Ace 250 was and remains a sleeper in terms of what it can find in heavily hunted locations.

What I see in the Deus is a detector that looks at the ground / targets differently which allows one to pull targets from areas that have run dry. I am not going to claim coins were recovered at 18 inches or underneath a slab of reinforced concrete but I have found targets that impressed my all the same. I plan to start posting some along with the conditions they were recovered in and the hurdles that the Deus was able to overcome in teh next few days to show what it is capable of.

I hope this answered your question . . . . . . if not, just whack me on the side of the head and ask again

Andy Sabisch

 

[Mike Hillis]

Hi Andy,
I have questions.

Are the target responses for each frequency "normalized" to some standard, or do they display the TID shifted based upon the frequency being used?

And do you find the ferrous/conductive graph useful?

And is the custom tone feature easy to use?

HH
Mike

 

[scoper]

Hi Andy,i detect in England and use a goldmax power...my friend uses the deus.We have done the same test as yourself in that we have compared the same targets with both detectors to see if one picked up targets that the other did not.After extensive testing we have come to the conclusion that both detectors perform about the same on inland sites.As the goldmax power is about half the price,is it not better value for money if inland site searching is the only hunting you do.I know that the deus is capable of hunting the wet sand at the beach but for some this may be irrelevant if they are not interested in this facet of the hobby.Thanks for listening.

 

[Andy Sabisch]

I've hunted a good deal at sites throughout Europe and England and have to say that the conditions over there are in most cases a good bit different than they are here . . . the type of targets being sought, the ground conditions and even the trash concentration.

Hunting sites in both England and Germany this past year that dated back 100's of years, I was amazed at just how little trash there was in the ground - a park in eastern Germany that had a sign stating it had been founded in 1721 had plenty of targets to be found but it was a rarity to find pull tabs or aluminum trash which is all over in the ground here - it really says something about how we treat our sites . . . but I digress. Soil conditions are also different with mineralized red clay, alkali dirt on the Southwest and very concentrated black sand on many ocean beaches posing challenges that are not seen elsewhere around the world. Detectors that excel in say Europe in many cases struggle here for these reasons.

I brought back one of the XP units in 2005 and found that it worked well but not as well as it had when I hunted some WWII airfields and some Roman sites in Southern England . . . . but then there are detectors built here that excel in one part of the country and then perform sub-par in others.

The upgradeability (I think this is a word ) is another check in the advantage column for the Deus . . . how often have we bought something and found that a better, faster, more feature-packed

 

[Andy Sabisch]

Mike

Good to hear from you as well . . . . . hope you are doing well in the field!

Hopefully this answers your questions . . . . . .

=========================================

Are the target responses for each frequency "normalized" to some standard, or do they display the TID shifted based upon the frequency being used?

There is some slight shift in Target ID numbers based on the frequency selected (not the slightly shifted values at each of the 4 main frequencies which allows interference to be compensated for) but it is not a large shift . . . . a bit of practice in the field when you switch frequencies is all that it took me to see what the shift was and since you will likely stick with a specific frequency for a specific type of hunting (18kHz would not be my preferred coin hunting frequency but more of a beach frequency for example), once you get the numbers down, you should be set

 

[mudpuppy]

n/t

 

[Barry NY]

Hi Andy - as a Deus owner with over 125 hours under my belt I've gotten into a good groove with a custom program that works for me in my detecting environment.

I'm curious what you are finding (as you play with the machine) regarding your experiences and preferences with the GB (ground balance) function. As a long time E-Trac user GB was never something I needed to worry about...so I'm not that comfortable with the technical aspects behind that function. Are you using manual, auto, tracking and if manual how are you setting it up?

Also, I've been having poor results with setting up the non-motion audio discrimination mode - I know it needs to be precisely set up, but since it does add a few inches to the detection depth it's a good feature to use for a quick check on an iffy signal. Any pointers on how to use this feature would be appreciated.

Thanks,

Barry

PS - let me know when you can come up to Long Island for a few days and hit some of my fields. On Friday we pulled a 1718 one reale, 1817 half reale and 1894O Barber from one of my farm field sites where in the fall I found a 1666 one reale cob...that's on top of a few large coppers and tons of colonial buttons...anything is possible in these fields...

 

[jmaryt]

hi andy!
can you elaborate on what you mean by the deus
"looking at the ground/targets differently?"..thanks!

(h.h.!)
j.t.

 

[BH_Landstar_]

Andy,

The 18kHz setting on the Deus, is it as good as the X-Terra 705 using one of the 18.75kHz coils or better in detecting small gold items in any enviroment ?

 

[Ism]

Andy,

Thanks for evaluating the Deus. I was going to purchase one from France a couple years ago when I first heard about it. I saw the videos, loved the concept but didn't like the idea of having a detector that must be sent back to France for a battery change. The plan to introduce the Deus to the USA was fraught with obstacles so I just wasn't going to chance forking over $1300 for a detector that isn't supported in the USA. Yeah, the price was $1300 and change from France. However it was questionable if a tariff would be paid. It wasn't on the list but a tariff could be added if the US govt. just happened to have a bad hair day.
So I never went through with it.

Now the Deus is in my sights again. Your expert evaluation will go a long way to selling me one in the near future.
Ran

 

[Finder82]

Andy,

The 18kHz setting on the Deus, is it as good as the X-Terra 705 using one of the 18.75kHz coils or better in detecting small gold items in any enviroment ?

I had a X-terra 70 with the 18.75khz 6" dd coil and sensitivity with the Deus 18khz mode seems to comparable to the Small X-terra coil.

I just tried the Deus fast 18khz mode and it can detect a lead 4,5mm air rifle pellet.

 

[Larry (IL)]

I would like to hear some user info on the 4kHz mode and maybe the larger coil for deep silver hunting in pretty clean ground.

 

[Blank Planet]

other than being wireless and having 4 frequencies that can only be used one at a time and having fast recovery whats so special about it?? looks pretty flimsy to me. i need tough well built gear i work em hard and they need to pass the tough test after all its a dirt sport not a video game.

i have detectors that cover those 4 feq's and are super fast how fast is this thing? looks a bit like the star ship enterprise is it warp speed or what?

is the guts of the thing in the coil? wouldn't think that's a real good idea get bashed around down there?

what goes on in the headphones? what if you drop them is it good nite? we have all drooped our phones!!

sorry but someone has to play devils advocate here and not just believe everything they are told, so i hope i am wrong but doesn't seem to have anything i cant get else where.



BP

 

[Barry NY]

Hey BP. What's most special is that you will have the best detecting experience (from an ergonomic perspective) you will have ever had. Detecting is supposed to be fun, and yes hopefully we make good finds. But time and time again I hear many people say "it was great just to get out" - that's after a long day when they didn't make any great finds. So the fun and ease of use is surely important. I don't know about you, but after an hour swinging the E-Trac with 10x12 SEF my wrist was killing me. Forget the 12x15 SEF - that is killer weight. You need to be harnessed up to work that unit all day.

It is not "flimsy" at all. You need to handle it to believe it. It's as tough built and sturdy as the 6 pound E-Trac. I have spent 8 hour days on plowed fields and 8 hour days is wooded terrain - the unit stood up well to the task. As a matter of fact it was great not having any wires to deal with in the woods...

It is warp speed beyond belief. You can go to a 5 reactivity. The Deus Fast program is using a 3. Your fastest detectors on the market today are maybe a 1. The E-Trac is probably a 0. With reactivity speed comes a drawback - loss of depth. The super fast speed was created for UK rallies where you are racing around looking for thin hammered and trying to dig as many targets as you can. There are videos online showing someone swinging this thing at warp speed with nails and coins within inches of each other and the machine clearly signals all of the coins and disc out all the nails. Any other machine would see the three targets as one target...swinging that fast.

The guts are in the coil - yes. The coil is no thicker then your usual one. I think they have mastered the art of miniature electronics packed into this thing.

The phones work great. If you drop them they are fine as they're very light. If you drop them in water that may be a problem as the headphones can act as a full detector themselves - they have a full electronic unit on one end. As an aside, the control unit can operate the machine with a plug in 1/8" headphone not using the supplied wireless phones. The wireless phones can operate the machine not using the control unit. If you buy the large coil and mount it on it's own shaft - you get an additional functioning machine as someone can use the stock coil with control unit with wired phones and someone else can use the large coil with the wireless phones - at the same time. So $1900 (full unit) + $560 (large coil) + $150 (shaft) = $2610 / 2 = $1305 for 2 Deus units fully operational.

It's good to be a devils advocate and ask hard questions from real users. And I'm not selling them either...

 

[Blank Planet]

Thanks barryny

very well put together answers.

i like the weight factor for sure !! etrac some days is hard work.

have you used a Gold Bug Pro that's the fastest machine i have used super good in iron but like you said fast = depth loss. and is up 19kHz for working iron infested gold field sites.

still have a problem with the coil but like the idea of 2 in one machines i know other machines have the guts in the phones like the detector pro guess it takes some getting used to new ideas.

will it hit deep silver? seems its being marketed as etrac competition. i have seen all the etracs on ebay UK being sold so guessing these people are buying the XP ?

just from my experience even if using a fast machine i need to go slow sometimes will this work slow as well?

thanks heaps for your answers

BP

 

[Finder82]

just from my experience even if using a fast machine i need to go slow sometimes will this work slow as well?

Yes, it will work also with a slower swing speed.

 

[Blank Planet]

OK then who's going to lend me the cash so i can do my own testing like i need another metal detector maybe when i get half the house from the divorce i can live in a trailer park with my detectors and look for my mind or a new wife which ever comes 1st

 

[Barry NY]

I have not used the GB Pro. What I can say is that the Deus Fast program (there are 9 pre made programs but you can custom design anything you need and copy it over onto one of their 9 slots) is set up specifically for iron infested Roman sites where hammereds and small silver Romans may be hiding. That's using reactivity #3. They claim at #3 it's the fastest machine made - and it can go to #5...

I believe it is competition to E-Trac in the right environment. I have the E-Trac and ALL my detecting buddies have an E-Trac. We hunt clean farm fields and woods. All Revolutionary era sites (we're lucky).
In these environments we compare each others signals all the time. There has yet to be a situation where the Deus got a signal they didn't get with the E-Trac or where the E-Trac got a signal that the Deus didn't get. That's on the signals we, of course, compared. My experience has been that the Deus on 12kz gets tiny thin stuff better than the E-Trac. I got 2 thin half reales at 6" last week and a seated half dime at about 5". I'm not saying that the E-Trac would not have hit them either. But I do get a ton of tiny cuff or collar buttons 7mm in size at very good depth. Regarding deep silver, I think in the plowed fields we have a tendency to only get the upper 7" finds as we tend to detect faster to get more coverage. I have not used the Deus on an old home site or in an old park where deep silver may be present. Tests done by some of the UK guys do show that the Deus finds deep 9"-10" silver in pasture.

My biggest "concern" is that the target ID is not as precise as I would like. That really plays a role in park and home site detecting where you are specifically looking for deep silver. I'm digging everything over a 40 (E-Trac 12-15) with the Deus. So I'm not really "concerned" when an 88 winds up being a 72 when dug - just "disappointed". I'm digging it anyway as it only takes a few seconds to recover the target in a plowed field.

If this means anything - I used to take the E-Trac with me (along with the Deus) as backup every time I went out detecting. Now it just sits on the wall in my garage...