Upgrading to Etrac from DFX?

[Ohio Digger]

Have any of you guys (gals) switched from a Whites DFX to an Etrac? What kind of differences did you notice? Did you pull anything from previously hunted sites? I'm in the process of getting some pricing on an Etrac and will hopefully add one by the end of the week. I'm very impressed with the DFX in the short time I've had it. I'm just really interested to see if the Etrac lives up to the hype! Any insight from any Etrac users would be greatly appreciated.

 

[tyelvert]

Good Morning,

Having been a whites user for 30 years, and JUST recently (a month ago) purchased a e-trac, here's what I find:

Whites & Minelab

1) Better Made all around detector 'casing & structure' ....... AND THAT'S ALL FOR THE PRO'S!!!

E-trac Pro's

1) Circuitry, stableness depth & everything else.....superior!

 

[Stormrider51]

I have both although my wife took over the DFX when I got the E-trac. I can tell you that they are very different machines. The DFX seems, at first, to be the easier machine to use. After all, it gives you tones, an icon, a number, and a graph. You would think you could nail what is down there every time. The E-trac gives you tones, TWO numbers (ferrous and conductive) and a graph (that seems mostly useless to me). Of course, both detectors have a zillion possible adjustments and possible programs. Coming from the DFX, when I first got the E-trac I got really frustrated with it. Frustrated enough that I went back to the DFX for a while. The icon and graph seemed so much more familiar and reassuring. Then it dawned on me that I was digging just as much trash with the DFX as I had with the E-trac. It was time to give the E-trac another chance. Others had told me that the E-trac takes about 30 hours to learn and that one day I'd just "get it". I have to admit that they were correct. I don't know how to explain it but one day I got home with a fistfull of coins and only three pull tabs. More importantly, I had several nickles but only those three pull tabs. In my experience nickles and pull tabs go together and that's just a fact of life. Until now, apparently. I must have "gotten it".

As for relative depth capability I can only say that I took the E-trac to an old church yard that I knew I had hunted pretty thoroughly. As a matter fact I had searched it with an old Garrett Grand Master Hunter, again with a Garrett Ace 250, then with the DFX before I showed up with the E-trac and the standard 11" coil. I didn't expect much. I was surprised when I started pulling coins from from the ground that I must have walked right over with another machine and probably more than one.

If you don't already have one, you can greatly speed the E-trac learning process by making a target garden. I have different coins, pull tabs, and bits of trash buried at different depths. I know what's down there at each spot so I can scan it while listening to the tones and seeing the numbers. It helped me a great deal. Forget air testing the E-trac.

One other major difference between the DFX and E-trac is sweep speed. Get ready to slow down. A lot. If the E-trac has a shortcoming it's that the microprocessor is sorting a huge amount of data and I'm guessing it is right at the edge of its capability. I have found that I get the best results when a sweep from one side to the other takes about 4 seconds. That seems glacially slow compared to my sweep speed with the DFX and any other detector I've used in the past. Take a deep breath, relax, and let the coil just float along over the surface.

It's a great machine!
Storm

 

[sprchng]

I went from the Eagle Spectrum(pre XLT) to the DFX to the e-trac and it was the best transition I ever made. The lack of ruggedness and poor exterior design of the White's machnes always left me wanting a "modern" detector. In spite of the info derived from the DFX I still seemed to dig alot more trash than with the e-trac now. The tones on the e-trac are much more useable and informative while the 191 tones of the DFX was too much of a calliope. If the numbers don't match the tones on the e-trac it bears investigating. When you get tones with it which sound like the intro music to an old sci-fi movie you simply have to dig it. Those tones are much simpler than checking a tone, VDI , spectragraph, and icon on the DFX---thank White's for the fade rate setting.

I simply do not understand the complexity issues people continue to drop on the e-trac. There are really only a few items to play with on the e-trac versus the pages of menued items on the DFX or even the old Spectrum for that manner. The e-trac is by far the simplest discriminating detector I've ever gotten to know especially if one realizes the numbers run in blocks of good and bad which correlate to the sounds and when your done pulling the good out you know the stuff you're leaving behind is the junk.

The DFX is a very capable machine but you will master the e-trac much quicker if you resign yourself to digging the first couple of times out. I sold my DFX and bought a F75ltd for a back-up/lightweight relic hunting detector which the e-trac isn't--light weight that is. That will probably be the switch I'll regret for a good long time.

 

[Ohio Digger]

That's my main complaint with the DFX. You have so many adjustments to worry about getting "right". My concern is that if I have something dialed incorrectly I'm going to miss something. I've found some great finds with the DFX, but I'd like to see what I might be missing. Hopefully I can find a good deal on a nice used one. I've been looking. Thanks for all the info folks.

 

[Seatedhalf]

I use the basic coin program most of the time for my hunting. I do run it hot though. I recommend that you take the dfx with you and compare signals to start with. Take it to the trashiest areas when you have the sounds down and compare signals. I did it for a month using E-trac first and then trying to see if DFX would pick it up. Most of the time it would not see the coin in or through the trashy areas even with a 6x9 DD coil or the 6 inch concentric.That month made it very easy to get rid of the DFX. My brothers MXT performed poorly as well on most deeper good signals with his 6x9 as well. The 11-inch standard coil on E-trac is great and I bought the 8 incher and find great results with it also..

I found that the E-trac performs much better where there was a lot of emf interference with the dfx(used mine for 5 yrs).

The sounds of the E-trac can be closely matched to what the DFX sounds like if you want too. It made it easier for me to change over.

Best silver count with DFX was 20 coins in a year and 170+ wheats. I used E-trac in the same areas that the dfx and two other whites products were used over a 6 year period and for the last two seasons I have found 275 silver coins as deep as 11 inches and over 1250 wheats as deep as 12 inches.

Like storm said sweep speed is one of the biggest keys. It can be swung very slowly in the trashiest of areas and pick all signals up. Most E-trac users go by sound first and numbers second. I advise the same approch and it will be confusing what to dig for a little bit. Dig the short/choppy signals and the one-direction stuff and you will like the results. I rarely dig the metal beer caps(my DFX seemed to attract them) anymore unless they are in the hole with a coin.

Long story short: I find a lot more good stuff in the same amount of hunting time compared to my M6 and DFX

 

[BHNugget]

I went from the DFX to the Etrac last august. I went from the start of the season(early march) to late august with the DFX and found approx. 12-15 silver dimes in that time. Beginning late august to mid November the Etrac got me 80+ silver dimes (rosies mercs and barbers) and 13 silver quarters. All were found in the same areas hunted with the DFX. Early march , this year to now I'm at 13 silver dimes and one barber half dollar, still hunting the same areas as last year. The depth ID accuracy of the Etrac compared to the DFX is unreal. The Etracs FBS doesn't seem to have the "wrap" issues (as Whites describes it) other detectors do.

 

[MrBranton33]

I have the DFX and E-trac, and love both machines. I like to scout a new spot with the DFX, and locate the areas that are target rich. The DFX can cover a lot of ground with it's faster swing speed and still pull a bunch of keepers, and deep as well.
Later I hit the dense spots with the E-trac and work them hard and slow and pull out the deep and masked stuff. The E-trac is very deep even at slow sweep speeds. I've noticed that my other machines go very deep with a faster swing, and when you slow way down you miss some of the deep targets. This is where the E-trac shines,it goes deep when slow hunting, plus the accurate target ID makes it a bit easier to tell trash from treasure. I'm keeping both Once you get the DFX dialed it's a great machine, a bit more of a learning curve in my opinion, but very versatile once you figure it out. The E-trac in high trash and Two tone Ferrous will pull a lot of keepers the others miss. Both are very nice machines!