Nokta The Legend
Nokta Legend Tone Profiles: Which Audio Setting to Use and Why
Quick answer
Tone profiles decide how The Legend splits the 0 to 99 scale into sounds. Fewer tones give a clearer yes or no on clean ground, more tones give finer information in trash, and a tone break placed just above the iron band is what lets you hear a good target sitting between two nails.
Audio is where experienced detectorists actually make decisions. The screen tells you a number after the fact; the tone tells you about the target while the coil is still moving, and it carries information the number throws away, including how sharp the response is and whether it holds from every direction. On The Legend the tone system is configurable enough that two owners can run the same machine and hear completely different hunts.
The Legend 2 listing describes harmonic tones with adjustable frequencies, which is the same idea taken further: the pitch you hear can be tuned to your own hearing rather than being fixed by the factory. That matters more than it sounds if your ears have lost the top end, which after a few decades is most of us.
Top pick
Nokta Bluetooth Low Latency Headphones for The Legend
The matched low latency Bluetooth set for The Legend, because tone information is worthless if the audio arrives late enough to break the link between sound and sweep.
Price was accurate when this page was compiled and changes often.
Which tone profile should I use on which site?
The number of tones is a trade between clarity and information. On a clean field you want a fast decision. In a nail bed you want to hear the character of every response, even if it makes for a noisier afternoon.
Two tone audio is the fastest way to work clean ground, while multi tone and full pitch audio carry the extra information needed to pick a coin out of an iron-heavy site.
| Profile | What you hear | Best for | The trade |
|---|---|---|---|
| Single tone | One pitch for every accepted target | Pure depth hunting, deep silver, relic ground with the screen ignored | No conductivity information by ear at all |
| Two tone | Low for iron, high for everything else | Beaches, clean pasture, learning the machine | Cannot separate a nickel from a quarter by ear |
| Three or four tone | Iron, low, mid and high conductors split | General parkland and coin hunting | Needs learning before it becomes automatic |
| Multi tone by ID | Pitch tracks the target ID up the scale | Iron-heavy sites, experienced ears | Busy and tiring on trashy modern ground |
| Pitch or full audio | Pitch and volume both vary with the target | Judging size, depth and shape by ear | The steepest learning curve on the machine |
Profile names and the exact option list follow the Nokta Legend user manual and vary by firmware version. Check the audio menu on your own machine.
Where should the tone break sit?
The tone break is the point on the scale where the machine stops calling something iron and starts calling it a target. Put it slightly above the top of your own measured iron band rather than at a number somebody quoted online, because your soil sets that band. On most ground the iron band ends somewhere in the middle teens, which is why our target ID chart places nails below about 15.
Set it too low and rusted iron will sing at you as a good target all day. Set it too high and you will silence the foil and small gold band, which is exactly where jewellery lives. If you are hunting rings rather than coins, accept the iron chatter and move the break down.
Why does iron volume matter more than discrimination?
Because hearing iron is how you find the good target beside it. If you reject iron entirely the machine goes silent over a nail bed and you walk across it believing it is empty ground. If you let iron speak at a low volume, you learn the texture of the site: where the buildings were, where the rubbish was thrown, and where the ground is worth slowing down for.
The practical setup most relic hunters land on is iron audible but quiet, a fast recovery speed and a small coil. That combination, covered in the settings by site type page, turns a nail bed from a wall of noise into a readable site.
Does wireless audio cost you anything?
Latency is the thing to care about. Tone work depends on the sound arriving while the coil is still over the target, so a low latency link is not a luxury. The Nokta listing for the matched Bluetooth set specifies low latency for this machine, which is the reason to prefer it over a general purpose pair of headphones.
If your machine goes under water, wireless stops being an option at all, and a wired submersible set rated beyond 100 feet is the answer. For an older machine with no Bluetooth, the Nokta 2.4 GHz Green Edition set works through its supplied transmitter, and the same wireless standard is what the PulseDive connects to through its built in wireless module.
Sources
- Nokta The Legend user manual, audio and tone settings sections
- Nokta The Legend 2 published product listing features
- Nokta Bluetooth Low Latency Headphones for The Legend published listing
- Thresher submersible headphones published listing specifications
Frequently asked questions
How many tones should I run on the Nokta Legend?
Start with two tones while you learn the machine, then move up as your ear develops. Two tones give a fast clean decision on open ground. Multi tone carries far more information and is what most experienced owners run on iron-heavy sites, because the pitch tells you roughly where on the scale a target sits before you ever look at the screen. There is no single correct answer, only a correct answer per site.
What are harmonic tones on the Legend 2?
Nokta's listing for the Legend 2 describes 99 target IDs with harmonic tones and adjustable frequencies, meaning the pitch assigned to targets can be tuned rather than fixed. The practical benefit is for hearing: if your ears have lost sensitivity at the top of the range, being able to bring the pitch down keeps high conductive targets audible. It is a comfort and fatigue feature as much as an accuracy one.
Should I turn iron volume all the way down?
Rarely. Silencing iron makes a trashy site sound empty, and on old ground the iron is the map: it tells you where structures stood and where rubbish was dumped. Most experienced users run iron audible but quiet, so it registers without dominating. The exception is a modern park where the iron is fencing wire and nothing historic is present, and your time is better spent covering ground.
Can I use any Bluetooth headphones with the Legend?
You can pair general purpose headphones with many modern machines, but standard Bluetooth introduces a delay between the coil passing the target and the sound reaching your ears, which breaks the link tone hunting depends on. The Nokta set listed for The Legend specifies low latency for exactly this reason. If you already own low latency headphones they may serve, but test them over a known target before trusting them.
Do tones work underwater?
Wireless audio does not, because the signal does not travel through water. The Simplex Ultra listing notes that Bluetooth headphones are not included in the package, and even when a wireless set is bundled it is a dry land accessory. If you intend to submerge the control box you need a wired submersible headphone set. Our waterproof ratings page collects the published depth figures for the machines and the accessories together.
Researched, not professional advice. This page is compiled from published specifications, manuals and owner-review consensus, not hands-on testing. Target ID numbers, depth figures and settings vary with soil chemistry, moisture, target size, depth, orientation and firmware version, so treat every figure here as a starting point and verify it against your own machine's manual and your own ground. As an Amazon Associate we earn from qualifying purchases.