Not sure if you will see this in a timely manner for my needs Merrill; however, I'd like to get your recommendation. Recently, manticore's and equinox 900 both went on sale making them nearly the same price. I know one major advantage to the 900 is that it comes with that extra smaller coil. One proported advantage of the manticore is beach in beach functioning, which is also an area the manticore proportedly has more depth capability.
My circumstances: I live in Utah and most of my "beach" hunting will be in fresh water. Though we do occasionally go to the west coast or Florida where saltwater hunting will occur. The 1 extra mode in the 900 for gold detecting is appealing, but not sure how much (still a bit of a newbie to this).
Because of the sale, I bought both the 900 and manticore and now I have 30 days to figure out which one I'm going to keep & return the other. That being said, my question is: given my circumstances and basically the same price for both detectors - which detector would you recommend I keep? (Especially if it's going to be my only detector.)
Not speaking for anyone but myself....
Usually, I would say you probably can't go wrong with either, but your situation is a little different...
When I did my research late last year, those two detectors made my final list. I went another way, however, if I had gone with Minelab, I would have gone with the Manticore, hands down.
You've probably read/seen these, but here are some comparisons & reviews.
https://www.google.com/search?client=firefox-b-1-d&q=equinox+900+vs.+manticore
As far as programs (beach, park, gold, etc.) go, they're all just different combinations of the machine's capabilities. You should be able to program the Manticore to do pretty much
anything the 900 can do (perhaps some minor exceptions, perhaps some better).
Merrill rated the 700/900 slightly higher than Manticore, BUT please (re-)read Merrill's Thoughts on BOTH. The highlighted first paragraph under the Manticore should explain the rating discrepancy.
But there's also something to be said for your gut feeling & aesthetics. One may just feel/swing better to you, you may prefer the color screen of the Manticore over the monochrome 900, or as you noted, coil availability.
Like yourself, mine is my only detector. I have no regrets, but I don't think I'd have any with the Manticore either.
I hope I've helped and not obfuscated things. 🤔