I won a Tracker IV and it was pretty much like yours, about 3 inches on an inground coin. Also played with a QDII and a Discovery 3000, they had average depth, but the Time Ranger really surprised me. On higher conductive coins it had very good depth. I dug a wheatie at almost 9 inches, checked depth with tape since I was testing the detector. That's as deep as I've ever got a penny and I've had way too many of the "top end" detectors. No contest between the TR and LST for depth on pennies, dimes and quarters, the TR blew it away but the LST did have a pretty big edge on nickels and lower conductive targets like small foil. I don't know if the production models have the same performance as the proto but it did darn well. I'd choose the Golden