Tye said:
Jonathan, I am a little confused by your ATX brilliant statement and I know I'll find gold with one statements to Steve.
They sounds very positive.
.
On the other hand....
On at least one 'down under' forum you make statements about the ATX based on, as you put it, almost nothing.
Here is just a couple of your statements that I found quite negative. In the first one It is rather funny how you're trying to have your cake and eat it too..
"Do any of you seriously want to go back to dealing with ground noise and hot rocks to achieve performance? You can easily do this by reverting to the GP 3500! My remarks were not made to knock the ATX but to point out what we already have at our fingertips and by the look of things take for granted, going by the ATX reviews so far the Garrett does not do any of those things."
And this lovely little piece of negativity without really knowing much of anything:
"I've had a look at the videos on YouTube and nothing has overly impressed me so far, one thing I do not like is what seems like a very slow response time on a nugget dig at Rye Patch, on deep nuggets a slow response is going to kill your ability to differentiate between ground noise anod a good target. Also by the look of things the detector is going to rely on DD coils to tame hot ground so there will be no mineralisation eating timings like Smooth or Enhance or Fine Gold, imagine going back to a world of Hot Rock soccer? "
I think everyone knows your a Minelab 'homer' including this guy who made this reply to your statements above:
"Hi JP,
The GPX series is no better at finding gold than the 3000 or the extreme, you still have too identify all hotrocks, you pay $4000 extra to run a tad quieter on noisy ground, the older machines could still find 95% of what the GPX's can with a good operator
The topic is about the ATX and its capabilities, until someone who can operate one and then do proper testing I cant see a reason for you Minelab boys to need to say jack sh!t about comparing kahoonas
Ron"
At best.... it's confusing.. What should one make of your comments to the various audiences?
Cheers,
Tye
Tye, what I've said about the ATX is consistent with what Steve has said, my comments on the other forum,which are now completely out of context here now that you have singled them out, were in reference to comments made by others making direct comparisons against the GPX 5000!!! I have a number of places here in OZ where I used to dredge years ago, we often got detectable gold in our dredges, the river runs through a highly mineralised belt where the Minelab PI detectors have done really well, but no one has ever detected the river bed because the river runs all year!!! I feel the ATX would be BRILLIANT in that scenario!!
My other comments are based entirely on our gold field conditions here in OZ, ANYONE serious about their detecting in Australia uses one of the "Smooth" type timings in conjunction with a Monoloop coil on the Minelab machines, ask Steve which coil and timing combination he mainly used during his field trip with me a few years ago? This is why I'm not overly impressed with the latest Garret offering for Australian conditions!!! The word around the traps here is some dealers are promoting the ATX as a GPX 5000 beater, going by the limited amount of information I've seen on the ATX that is simply not the case and I felt it was necessary to put some perspective on the reality of the situation before we start seeing people disappointed all over again just like the Infinium fiasco a number of years back.
I take exception to your comments,
Tye said:
I think everyone knows your a Minelab 'homer'.........
I do this for a living so use the equipment that best suits my needs in the conditions I work in! I also do this for passion, and as such I purchased a Garrett Infinium, I have a GS5B and investigated the TDI, I own a Fisher GBII and will happily put my money down on any detector that will offer me an edge so might spring for an ATX once I get more feedback on how it performs compared to the Infinium!!
Comparing apples with Apples the ATX will have its place in the scheme of things thanks mainly to it being water proof!! A water proof PI for AU$3500 to $4000 could be beneficial for some especially those who know of nuggety areas in watery places. Hopefully the dealers here in OZ will promote the detector in a sensible fashion and on its merits. As can be seen by some of the comments both here and the OZ forum, there are strong feelings out in the general detecting public about monopolies with Minelab being the detector company under the spot light. I personally feel it's high time one of the other manufacturers brought out a detector that can compete performance wise with Minelab, competition is a good thing especially when you do this for a living.
Yes I'm Minelab biased, but as Steve Herscbach and Chris Ralph can attest I work in some of the most extreme mineralised environs on the planet, consequently I have to use the equipment that performs in those environs.
Lastly, I'm not for one second saying Garrett USA have been promoting the ATX in a questionable manner, in fact quite the opposite. I'm looking forward to reading more about this new detector offering from Garrett and seeing how it performs around the goldfields of the world.
JP
I like detecting and I especially like finding gold, sometimes just using something simple and fun like the Fisher GBII I commandeered off you is all I need for a nice time out doing what I love best. There will be places in OZ where the ATX will be brilliant, if its better than an Infinium then I know for sure I will find gold with one of them. Am looking forward to when you have your hands on one so I can see how you go with it.