Minelab Equinox 900 Review: The One Machine Argument, Tested Against the 700

Four published differences, and they are smaller than the price gap suggests. The 900 lists six single frequencies against four on the 700. It adds a fourth search mode, Gold, to the 700 Park, Field and Beach. Minelab publishes 119 high-resolution target IDs on the 900. And the 900 ships with the EQX 6 coil alongside the stock EQX 11, where the 700 ships with the 11 alone.

That last item is the one that decides the purchase for most people. The small Double-D is the coil that finds targets on ground that has been hunted out, because a large coil passing over a coin and a nail three inches apart returns one blended signal that usually reads as iron. Bought separately the EQX 6 costs $225.00, which closes most of the gap between the two machines on its own. If you were always going to buy the small coil, the 900 is the cheaper route to owning it, and the coil size chart explains why that coil matters more than the extra frequencies do.

The rows below come from the catalog, which carries only figures each maker publishes. This is the comparison most buyers are actually making.

Box contents move the real price more than the sticker does, particularly on coils and headphones.

The first weakness is the 700 itself. Both machines run the same Multi-IQ engine, both are published at 2.8 lb on carbon fibre shafts folding to 24 inches, both are rated to 16 feet, both include low-latency wireless headphones. If you hunt inland parks, pasture and ploughed fields, you are paying $999.00 for a Gold mode you will never select, two single frequencies you will never switch to, and a coil you could buy later. Minelab has priced the 900 so that the honest answer for a large number of buyers is the cheaper machine, which is not something most reviews say plainly.

The second weakness is quieter and catches people out. The machine is rated to 16 feet and the included headphones are wireless, and wireless audio does not work underwater. Submerging an Equinox therefore means buying Minelab Equinox Waterproof Headphones at $170.00 or an aftermarket submersible set such as Gray Ghost Amphibian Headphones for Minelab. The machine is genuinely waterproof, but the kit as sold is not a diving kit, and the listing does not spell that out.

Third, and common to the whole Multi-IQ family: in electrically noisy urban parks the machine needs its noise cancel run and often needs sensitivity dropped, and a 900 run at full sensitivity next to overhead lines will chatter. That is physics rather than a defect, but a buyer expecting a flagship to be immune will be disappointed.

The dominant theme in published owner reviews is that the machine is unusually easy to get results from. The preset modes are good enough that a competent beginner finds coins on day one, while the single frequencies and the target ID resolution are there when the operator is ready for them. The second theme is beach performance: Multi-IQ on wet salt sand is the case simultaneous multi-frequency was invented for, and owners moving from a single-frequency machine describe the difference as a different hobby rather than a better machine.

The recurring complaints are consistent too. Owners report the carbon shafts can develop play at the cam locks with hard use, that the screen scratches and wants an Equinox Control Box Cover, and that the wireless headphones are a battery to remember. None of these are reasons not to buy it. Owners also consistently report re-learning their target IDs after firmware updates, which is exactly why the target ID chart tells you to keep your own buried test targets rather than trusting a printed table.

Buy it if:

• You hunt more than one kind of site, especially if one of them is a salt beach.
• You want one machine to cover park, field, beach and occasional gold without compromise.
• You were going to buy the small coil anyway, in which case the 900 is the cheaper path to it.
• You want the deepest target ID resolution short of the Manticore.

Skip it if:

• You hunt inland dry ground only. The Equinox 700 is the same engine for less.
• Your budget is under about $659.00, where the Nokta Legend Pro Pack also ships two coils.
• You want to dive rather than wade, without budgeting separately for wired submersible headphones.
• You mainly chase small gold, where a dedicated high-frequency machine wins.