Big sucking sound in the detector industry..........

[Ivan]

.................is how a metal detector dealer replied to my question on the new Garrett AT PRO. He said that the new Garrett detector will suck up most of the new sales. Even though he is a multi line dealer, he feels that many manufacturers are going to have to react to this new offering and rather quickly. He was quite adamant that lots of Whites and Tesoro sales especially, will be lost to the new Garrett. This usually happens when a new detector comes out.Whites is a solid company with excellent service and product lineup so they will take a temporary hit, same can't be said about Tesoro, their detector lineup is very dated!!!This new detector really raises the bar in respect to features for the price. Tesoro on the other hand is getting relegated to tot lot detectors.........they really need a new effective target ID detector to stay in the game. He has recently dropped the Minelab line due to customer service complaints, poor backup from Minelab and lots of heat from frustrated customers.(When things go wrong it's always the dealer that is on the firing line) He's getting lots of previous Minelab customers asking about the new Garrett and looking at the "F" series detectors in the Fisher line. He felt that Garrett is a master at marketing and gave the example of how to introduce a new detector with the AT PRO .....Fisher on the other hand has completely fumbled the G2 introduction!!! It was an interesting conversation as this dealer is know as a straight shooter and has been in the business over 30 years. Just thought I'd pass along some of this info.......thought it might generate some conversation and be of interest.

 

[Mainer]

I think he may be right. Not only the At Pro, but the Ace 350 and the new offerings such as the Gold Bug SE are definately going to draw away sales from the other companies. I have used, among others, Tesoros for years, but I already have several including a Tejon, so what do I buy next from them? Garrett also has the reputation of building solid machines and has a great customer service reputation, so it doesn't take much to figure this one out. I think in the long run, that the At Pro raising the bar and the competition it's going to generate will be beneficial to all of us because, as you stated, all the rest are going to have to come up with something competitive or take a tremendous hit on new sales. Customer loyalty can only be stretched just so far when a competitor is offering a lot more machine for the same money. Just my opinion.

 

[Ron from Michigan]

I hope Garrett does well with their new detectors.Bottom line in this business is performance, if the equipment works it will sell.On the other hand hype doesn't last long we will see what happens in the field.

 

[TabWhisperer]

If Tesoro can build a Tejon with the display of one of the big boys they will have success. The displays on the Cortes and DeLeon suck in comparison. I guess they must be set in their ways.

 

[TabWhisperer]

While I'm ranting White's need to lighten up on their detectors and get some plastic housings. They seem to be heading that way on the Prizm and Coinmaster series but they need to do it across the board. The wireless headphones need to be adapted by all manufacturers. A bluetooth standard would be nice too for buying third party headphones.

 

[Elton]

I for one hope the At pro is an excellent detector for all aspects of the Hobby. Mr Garrett has always in the past concentrated more on a machine that everyone could use out of the box with good to better results. This is a step up in the field.......... I wish Garrett Detectors all the best in their new venture of a what appears to be a top line detector at a more than fair price...........It has some awesome features...

 

[slingshot]

Well, I may be on the wrong track, but my little Compadre sees coins thru nails and still rejects the nail, as well as finding gold chains while rejecting them. Now as far as ID is concerned, won't the ID reading be off anyway with trash targets nearby? And since I'm basically a tot lotter and basically have no time to research old sites I think I'm pretty happy with this machine. Now if I win the lottery,on the other hand

 

[jim tn]

Good post Ivan and I'm quite sure the dealer has it pegged correctly. There are plenty of ardent Garrett users out there and they have had to wait a while for something new from Garrett. Then there are those that simply just like to try something new. From the looks of many posts, the detector is already a success...and the first one is not even out yet to the average joe. Good promotion, for sure. HH jim tn

 

[Mainer]

I agree with Ron about the performance, not the hype, that will make the difference. Garrett has , in the past, put out detectors with a lot of features and value for the money, and I'm sure that the AT Pro will be all they claim it to be. I wish them the best. Charles Garrett is also a great guy himself!!

 

[Critterhunter]

A re-post I did from elsewhere...

One thing that concerns me about the AT Pro. I've never been much of a Garrett fan but I've heard enough people rave about the depth of the Treasure Ace 250 to know it's got better depth than a lot of other machines on the market, at least when the minerals aren't too bad. I always thought finally Garrett has made a machine that can get down there in terms of depth at some sites. Along comes the AT Pro and I'm thinking that they must have built on the success of the 250. Well, after a little reading I see the Treasure Ace 250 is 6.5khz. That's good, because frequencies around that range and lower will hit hardest on silver/copper (my primary target) and also in general penetrate ground minerals better than a higher frequency. Well, I see the AT Pro is 15khz. While that's going to give it better gold sensitivity I don't want to trade off depth in high minerals or sensitivity to silver/copper coins myself. I always looked at it this way- When I'm gold ring hunting on land it's not as important to dig holes 12" deep in hopes of a gold ring (only to find a piece of trash), but when it comes to silver or copper coins I want all that extra depth ability to find them. There are plenty of shallow "junk" pull tab and other signals to dig that might be gold rings, but there aren't too many shallow "silver" signals to go after these days. Translation- Why build a machine that is going to be more sensitive to gold than it is silver/copper coins at depth? I wish they would have stuck with the same frequency of the TA 250. Had they done that I might have considered adding the AT Pro to my line up of machines. I like the screen and the fact that it's water proof. Looks like I'll be looking more into the Omega and T2LTD, as well as the F75LTD. Yes, some of those are high frequency machines too but at least they have the solid reputation of getting deep, which is yet to be proven either way with the AT Pro.

For the price of the AT Pro below I think $600 that's pretty good for a water proof detector. It's light enough to be used as a land machine, which can't be said about a lot of water units. Sure, they can be used on land but it's not too fun. Looks like that AT Pro might be a very good seller being a dual purpose machine like that, if it gets real good depth on silver on land and decent depth in the water on gold rings. I like the screen. I don't like that it only has 3 or 4 tones. After using my GT I can't handle a machine that doesn't have numerous multi tones. It makes hunting by ear so much more powerful and I only look at the meter to confirm what I think I hear when I want to. The adjustable iron rejection is nice. I love the fact that they give you the option to hear "unprocessed" audio versus just the "beep & dig" type response that I hate on so many machines, including the Explorers I've owned. Up until now the only machines I've owned that really gave in in depth audio details were certain Whites. My GT gives me that kind of finer audio detail, being long and drawn out to show you things about a target, yet it also has much more in the way of tones than a Whites...so thus far it's been the most telling machine audio wise I've ever owned. Where other machines speak with one or two "words" the Sovereign speaks in long sentences to clue you off to target traits. I'll have to listen to the AT and see how well it's audio is in comparison. It's so cheap that I may buy one down the road just for water hunting, though I'm more apt to buy an older Sovereign control box and stick that in a water proof control box. Since I already have coils for my GT I'd only need the box and an older model could probably be had for $50 to $70. All the Sovereigns for the most part get about equal depth, with some saying the GT is a bit deeper. It's a cheap way to build a water machine, and we all know the Excal/Sovereign is king of the beach in terms of handling black sand, salt, water, etc. I'll keep my eye on the AT Pro and decide down the road if I want to add it to my line up of machines.

I will say this- The price of the AT Pro as a water/land machine is going to sell well. If the depth on silver on land and gold in the sand is good then even if it isn't as deep as other top end machines it will still sell well because of that price and light weight. I also like the screen's looks.

 

[Woodchuck]

Only thing is its not a new name they used the At Pro name a while back.

 

[Sven]

Garrett forum guys are getting pretty defensive, mention anything like your a disbeliever
and waiting for the hype to clear............

I grew up with Garrett'e in the home all the way back from the first Deepseeker Master Hunter
and advanced thru many of the Garrett models they had no idea existed. Garrett units were
always dependable workhorses, they may not have been the deepest units but always got the
job done. never had to have one serviced until I bought a "used" Gti 1500. Had it back from
the factory in two weeks, no charge. That detector was a coin magnet, actually bought a second
one for my wife, she loved it. I eventually bought a Gti2500, a heavier unit I also enjoyed that
was sold when I moved to Georgia, it didn't like the high mineralization down there.

Right now waiting for the Lemmings to leap over to the AT Pro, when I see the results with no hype.
I may just get one--If it performs as well as people are saying who don't even own or have tried one.
That would mean I can sell off one water unit and one land unit and not worry about hunting when it's
wet out.

Good to see Garrett come out with something new.

 

[Tom_in_CA]

Yes, you are absolutely right slingshot: Some of the two-filter Tesoros (as well as two-filters from other manufacturers, like the old Whites classic series) were already great at seeing through (ie.: "averaging") targets better than power-house hunting machines. That part is not in dispute, and yeah, this new Garrett's not adding anything new there, that wasn't already seen on certain types machines already. But I think what they are going to try to say though, is that theirs is going to do it deeper than the competitors, is my bet.

As for loss of TID, the Garrett videos already acknowledge that compromise, that .... while you can knock out the iron, and still get a conductive signal averaging through a nail perhaps, yet the TID would now be off. You would only get hints of something conductive there, yet have the TID skewed (not a problem for dig-all type relicky ghost town sites, where all you intended to do was pass iron anyhow). I'm glad Garrett put this disclaimer explanation on their promotional video, because otherwise, it's an easy conclusion for beginners to come to, that they'll have effortless TID, in even the most junky of sites.

 

[Tom_in_CA]

Critter hunter, I want to address one thing you say, in your paragraph that starts with "One thing ....." : You are absolutely right about the arguments revolving around ability on low conductors, verses ability on high conductors. To the average person, if you said that "such & such machine is more sensitive to low conducting gold", they would think you are out of your mind to prefer a machine that is better for copper/silver, right? Because ..... afterall, gold is worth more!!

But as you have correctly pointed out: The reality of a lot of search environments (parks, schools, turf, etc...) leaves NO LACK of low conductors to choose from, ALREADY. Heck, if a person wants to up his low conductive target count in junky turf, he doesn't even need a machine more-sensitive to lower conductors as it is. You can even take a cheapo machine out to any inner-city-blighted old park, and simply turn down the disc, and presto! You can fill your apron with low conductive targets, till your arms fall off. No problem.

Now perhaps this "more sensitive to gold" argument could be made for specific environments where small gold is your goal (beach for instance) is a meritorious point.

 

[EZrider]

My intrest is to see how well the AT seperates targets. Most mid level machines run Zinc-Penny-Dime-Quarter. Problem with this is that wheat/memorial cents will hit as a silver dime. Crown caps will hit as quarters etc.

 

[Critterhunter]

Yep, that's always the way I thought about it. For the most part when you hit silver you know it before digging, so I'd rather have max depth/sensitivity ability on silver/copper coins. Hunting gold rings, on the other hand, there are plenty of shallow potential "gold" signals to dig, so if I'm going to trade one off for the other in terms of the frequency the machine uses then I want a low frequency machine to get me as deep/sensitive as possible on silver/copper. On the other hand, I've got a Sovereign GT so I don't have to compromise on any targets up and down the conductivity scale. It's going to hit them all hard. The other important thing (not a hard and fast rule but in general) is that lower frequencies tend to bounce off high minerals less, giving them better depth at some sites. That's not always the case. There can be instances where a certain higher frequency for some reason penetrates certain ground content better. Beyond all the above, many of these higher frequency machines are running with such high gain that they pretty much eliminate the frequency issue for various conductive types of targets. Still, that's also why some of those machines are pretty darn noisy and erratic.

 

[crazyman]

I hate seeing smart people get stupid over such trivial stuff.

 

[slingshot]

Critter hunter, I want to address one thing you say, in your paragraph that starts with "One thing ....." : You are absolutely right about the arguments revolving around ability on low conductors, verses ability on high conductors. To the average person, if you said that "such & such machine is more sensitive to low conducting gold", they would think you are out of your mind to prefer a machine that is better for copper/silver, right? Because ..... afterall, gold is worth more!!

But as you have correctly pointed out: The reality of a lot of search environments (parks, schools, turf, etc...) leaves NO LACK of low conductors to choose from, ALREADY. Heck, if a person wants to up his low conductive target count in junky turf, he doesn't even need a machine more-sensitive to lower conductors as it is. You can even take a cheapo machine out to any inner-city-blighted old park, and simply turn down the disc, and presto! You can fill your apron with low conductive targets, till your arms fall off. No problem.

Now perhaps this "more sensitive to gold" argument could be made for specific environments where small gold is your goal (beach for instance) is a meritorious point.

Tom, I appreciate your comments, but what's so peculiar about my Compadre is that it will pick up a gold chain while knocking out paper clips, small nails and yet NO OTHER detector I've owned will pick up the gold chain EVEN in a/m mode. I rubbed the chain on the coil of my Silver umax in a/m mode and it intermittently gave a scratching signal.

 

[Tom_in_CA]

critter, yes, next to a pulse or nugget machine, your type setup (2-filter discriminator) is probably the only machine that can do that. I grant you that. My post was not about the various machine's abilities, or inabilities, to do that. My only intention was to address the issue of people thinking that machines better at low conductors, are automatically to be more desired, than machines that excell at high conductors. Because there are no lack of low conductors, even now, for everyone's present machines, in junky blighted inner city urban park turf.

For example: your Compadre, as good as it is doing what you say, would be a major headache if you truly set it up to find teeennnssy little chains, gum wrappers, etc.... and took it to a bad-side-of-town type park, right? There are some zones where you'd never progress out of a 10 ft. by 10 ft. area, if you thought you were going to be a hero and rescue tinsel thin chains from the turf. Perhaps sandboxes offer that liberty of digging, but I can't imagine that kind of strip-mining in certain turf zones. I dunno, maybe it's just me, and the type parks we hunt for silver out here in CA. Not sure about other states, where parks are maybe more upscale?

 

[slingshot]

Good point, Tom. And yes, I have to choose my sites carefully.