Forgot to mention my other detectors:
Whites GMT - barely used yet, so no real info except it was a lot lighter than I thought.
Garrett Ace 250
Pros: very lightweight, you can swing it all day. Excellent at coin shooting on dry sand, grass and playgrounds. The bell tones are great on the goldies, and it excels at working close to playground equipment with the sniper coil. Very reliable, not much goes wrong with them, and very economical - lasts for ages on 4 AA batteries. Lots of aftermarket coils available for the Ace.
Overall, a very fun detector to own, and more capable than people give it credit for.
Cons: Lacks depth for accurate discrimination and tones on stock coils, not particularly good on wet sand, really needs a true all-metal mode for seeking deeper coins. Doesn't like mineralised ground with preset ground balance. Pricey to buy new vs some other more feature packed detectors.
Garrett Infinium LS
Pros: goes very deep, particularly on the beach. Reasonably light weight, auto ground balancing, frequency shift for reducing EMI, waterproof, multi use detector. Coils are a hell of a lot cheaper than on the current ATX. Reasonably good detecting time on 8 AA batteries
Cons: not as good on small gold as the current crop of pi detectors, you dig a lot of junk on the beach - did someone mention bobby pins and sparklers? Terribly fiddly coil and heaphone connectors that are prone to pin and shielding damage. Can be temperamental at times, not really a good detector for a newbie.
Teknetics G2 (aka Goldbug Pro)
Pros: Almost as lightweight as the Ace 250, with a very comfortable shaft setup = less fatigue. Large easy to read display, easy ground balancing with ground grab button, or manual method if preferred. You don't need a science degree to setup and start detecting, very easy to use. Excellent recovery time over nulled targets and iron, very effective discrimination - probably the best I've used, along with the Tesoro Vaquero. Very good at picking out targets masked by iron and other junk, and doesn't lose much depth in discrimination mode, unlike sone other detectors. Balances all the way to salt, making it very usable on wet sand. Cheaper than the Goldbug Pro, plus can use any of the goldbug coils on the G2. You also still get VCO tones on high conductor targets in discrimination mode vs a straight beep or grunt. Has small and large headphone sockets, negating the need for adapters.
Can't comment re gold detecting, yet to use it for that purpose.
Overall, although primarily marketed as a gold detector, it is really seems to be a jack of all trades detector, that is pleasingly effective in environments that it wasn't really intended for. Never thought I'd say that, but there you go.
Cons: Needs a backlit screen (F19), control box mount a bit flimsy, buttons can be hard to find at night, especially with weather resistant cover fitted or when wearing gloves. Could do with an optional mid tone for less conductive targets vs just high tones and grunts. No selective notching like on the F19, no volume control. Headphone sockets are on the left side of the control box, making it a pain for left handers (like me). Still likes aluminium bottle caps.
