Here are some testing results from another forum of mine in the states..
My first type of air test consisted of placing the target on the ground, with the shown settings of discrimination and threshold, with the discrimination setting set at zero. To maintain a certain level of reliability, I performed the test wearing sweat pants, T-Shirt, no rings, wallet, belt, watch with empty pockets and shoes with no metal. The measurements were taken from a static fixture, my leg, where the horizontal coil would barely yet audibly get a reading from the target lying horizontal on the ground, on an area free of any metal. I have fairly neutral ground, consisting of a humus layer in the upper stratus of about 3 inches, with clay below. The test was taken in my backyard, about 25 feet from my house. I had to deal with a large amount of EMI, having to retune the ATX at times to quiet it down. As previously mentioned, I measured the audio barely audible however still repeating against the still audible EMI. As predicted, the large gold ring managed to get the greatest depth. My understanding of the ATX platform is that it was specifically tweaked for gold. The other gold ring, considerably smaller in mass and diameter, also fared well. My favorite target for depth testing is a small lead 22 projectile, which came in at about 8 inches, with a sensitivity set at 6, possible max out at 13 and a threshold setting at 4 with a possible max also at 13. Running both these settings any higher just made the ATX too unstable at it's location. And, as a typical household, we own a couple large screen TV.s, cable, wi-fi for computer and cell phones.
This second test was was again performed in my back yard, only I moved the test away from the house another 10 feet. And again to maintain a certan level of reliability, I performed the test wearing sweat pants, T-Shirt, no rings, wallet, belt, empty pockets and shoes with no metal. What made this test different from the one above, is that instead of placing the target on the ground, I performed strictly an air test, measuring the distance between the coil and target, with no matrix past the coil except air. I was curious as to the amount of EMI present. As it turned out, the EMI was slightly less, however probably due to the air tests being performed further away from the source (house). One purpose of the test was to show the difference in depth with an increase of threshold on the ATX. The increase of threshold from eight to 10 while still maintaining a sensitivity of 8 showed about 1 inch increase with the large gold ring, 1 inch increase on the nickel and a doubling of depth on the small fleck of goldfrom 0.5" to 1". That fleck of gold is so tiny it won't read on my electronic weigh scale set in grams. I included a nickel in my air tests this time, as a nickel can be a good indicator for a piece of gold, and I also wanted to see how it would read, assuming that the ATX was tweaked for gold. The results are quite interesting, when comparing all the targets against each other.
Please remember......these are air tests, and your reading for depth in the ground will deviate from my results, based on ground conditions, water, moisture, target size, EMI, coil used, and how the machine is programmed. Air tests are useful for comparisons of settings against a target, and also comparisons against numerous targets, under different conditions.
------------------------
I have been here many times, with a lot of my buddies. We have pretty well cleaned it out of rings, old coins, lighters and junk. The last two times I hunted here, I used the Infinium, and even then, my last hunt I got zip. However, it's getting cold up here, and freeze-up is weeks away, so I thought I would do some land hunting. Most of my time so far with the ATX has been mostly in the water, with great success. I concentrated mostly in the shrubs and bushes, the spots others often times ignore.
My first good signal was a deep spoon, down about 12 inches. At least I was in an area where people were picnicking some 100 years ago.
Here's the total finds for the day. Lots of old shotgun shells, some iron, typical of PI.s, very deep too. The smaller 22 lead bullet was down about 6 inches, and gave a nice soft high-low. The larger one was a bit shallower.
---------
I have been doing some of fieldwork recently testing the new Garrett ATX metal detector. It was used both on land and freshwater. My initial thoughts on the new Garrett ATX PI (Pulse Induction) metal detector were quite remarkable. Now I have been using the Infinium (also a PI) since 2007 and also used the Garrett Sea Hunter Mark II for some time. They have each rewarded me with lots of gold/silver rings, jewelry and lots of coins. The new ATX is a much improvement over the Infinium. I was amazed at how well it responded to tiny conductors. Many a 22 shell/bullets and small buckshot slipped through my water scoop holes, located from decent depths. Using the 12" coil, it also responded well to various chains which I also dug from the fresh water lakes. I did manage one thin gold chain, the one shown below beside the gold ring.
That smaller coil based inside the larger coil 12" coils are both DD coils. I've been told that they both work together to respond to tiny conductive targets.
I also noticed an improvement in depth using the 12" coil on the ATX compared to the Infinium using the 10" x 14" mono coil. As my initial experience several years ago, going from a VLF water machine to a PI, I discovered a whole new crop of rings, coins, jewelry and also junk that were now available to me that other people using VLF detectors just could not reach. I had a record year that year using both my Infinium and other VLF water machines. Now with the ATX, I also ran into a similar scenario. I again found a new crop of coins, rings and junk at even deeper depths then the areas I hunted using my Infinium. Now in all honesty, the new crop was not as fruitful as when I internally used the Infinium, but the improvement was definitely there. I had to wait until the swimming was over for the summer to hunt most of my water locations, as the holes I had to dig with my scoop were very deep, and no matter how hard I try, I never seem to be able to get those deep holes filled in completely, so I opted to wait.
Now the ATX utilizes an iron check completely different from the Infinium. With a push of a button, running the coil over an unknown iron target will give a low audio similar to the iron audio featured on the AT Series. The ATX gave that iron response on bottle caps, large nails, rusty cans, metal washers and some recent Canadian clad. It is limited to depth, and seemed to work quite well on bottle caps to about 4 inches, more on tin cans and variable results with nails. It's up to the user to learn the limitations of this feature. I didn't use the discrimination mode at all, as it is one typical of PI's, in that it can be used to stabilize the detector in certain environments. It should not to be used to knock out certain targets, as you begin to loose depth as you increase the discrimination.
-----
Just food for thought for those considering buying the machine.
