signal boosters

hi all do I need to use one I have one from vtek solutions stinky petes company I need to know if I need to use it that's all please let me know thanks tim

Tim, did you buy to use? If you did then use it but make sure you know how to use.
Just use your machine how you have been shown. That is the best advice i can give you. Good luck.

I use B&Z booster with dual external speakers, wouldn't go without it, been using the B&Z boosters for about 15 years.

The only way you're going to know, is if you plug it in Tim.

Kon

davsgold wrote:I use B&Z booster with dual external speakers, wouldn't go without it, been using the B&Z boosters for about 15 years.

Will second Daves comment , QLD Peter sent me details how to wire second speaker more years ago than I can remember.
Tim, Can't comment on the Vtek but the boosters definitely make a difference, especially when your hearing drops off.

Bit OT, but the heading is "signal boosters"
My wondering is what these electronic devices actually do?
I use a ML4500 which, to my understanding, has an amplifier built into the battery pack which, through the main control panel, can vary the tone/volume plus other audio etc. of the signal heard through the plugged in headphones or speaker.
Using the control panel, I can alter this signal from basically silent, easy to listen to or blow my eardrums out.
What am I missing by not using a booster?
I have occasionally heard a distant detectorist with their threshold volume so loud and wailing it must have been deafening close up. Is this part of the "booster" operating technique?
Thanks for the understanding, but I may yet be convinced I require one more gadget
mike

Steelphase ....!

www.steelphase.com.au

OK so I do not use a 5000 or 7000 but I do have a 2300 and the odd one or two other tectas and I have used boosters on all of them. I have three different booster units, I will not mention brands or whatever to avoid argument. But I find that my detectors work just fine without the boosters.

Michael Boobook,
My understanding with regards to booster/enhancers is;
The booster does not increase the number of signals, if your standard machine does not locate a target a booster will not help.
The booster only enhances signals received, which in many instances may be missed because they are very faint or conditions, wind, scraping ground/rocks etc.
As we age our hearing decreases, usually the top end drops off so you will probably find more prospectors our age use a lower "hum" and not the upper "mosquito" level.

Thanks ttrash for that reference. If anyone cares to go to that site, have a look under the “Information” tab and click on “Videos”

The first video “Testing the sPO1” was not particularly informative given that two of the functions on the steelPHASE booster (mode & filter) were not explained.

However, I found the video “Gold Detectors How do they work?” particularly interesting. I have used a 4500 for years and for me the video was a valuable refresher course.
I think 5000 users (and to a lesser extent ZED users) would find the same.

Probably of greater interest and relevance to this thread was a question about boosters that was raised at around 34.27 in the video.

The response essentially agrees with what Nightjar said.

I would be interested to know how other brands of boosters treat the signal response.

Col

I wholeheartedly agree with Nightjar that using the lower tone is the go for older detector users. I have had my hearing tested and lower pitch works better for me, with even faint signals being much better at the lower end of the scale. People using a high pitch also risk damaging their hearing as it is the top end that is the more destructive to ones hearing.

yellowmellow wrote:hi all do I need to use one I have one from vtek solutions stinky petes company I need to know if I need to use it that's all please let me know thanks tim

Hi Yellowmellow ... what would you like to know... happy to help out
you can pm me if u like as rarely visit this site ... more on the facebook forums these days ....
cheers
Geoff
vkteksolutions

boobook wrote:Bit OT, but the heading is "signal boosters"
My wondering is what these electronic devices actually do?
I use a ML4500 which, to my understanding, has an amplifier built into the battery pack which, through the main control panel, can vary the tone/volume plus other audio etc. of the signal heard through the plugged in headphones or speaker.
Using the control panel, I can alter this signal from basically silent, easy to listen to or blow my eardrums out.
What am I missing by not using a booster?
I have occasionally heard a distant detectorist with their threshold volume so loud and wailing it must have been deafening close up. Is this part of the "booster" operating technique?
Thanks for the understanding, but I may yet be convinced I require one more gadget  
mike

A booster can only amplify whatever the detector audio delivers no matter what anyone try’s to tell you. The inbuilt booster speaker system in the Minelab GPX 4500, GPX 5000 is too coarse for effective use via the Target Volume control, this same control is also used on the GPZ 7000 in conjunction with the WM12 and is also too coarse!

I originally popularised the booster speaker concept when developing a series of instructional videos, looking for a way to obtain good audio that allowed ambient noise of a goldfields environment to also come through so viewers could experience as close a possible the way a detector sounds when in use. In conjunction with this I also discovered the benefits of removing the immediate audio from your ears and placing it further away allowing faint signals to come through (similar to a Television sounding loud in the kitchen compared to being right in front of it). Our ears are designed to collect sound, especially sound that is further away, our ears are also more sensitive to variation in pitch similar to our eyes are to movement so being able to hear the threshold at all times as a reference point is very important, but not at the expense of those around you and small target signals.

The aim with a booster speaker is to lift up the overall volume of faint deep targets without drowning everything else out, as such in less trashy sites a higher volume can be used in conjunction with the correct threshold level. You need to set the volume to compliment the threshold, which needs to be smooth and stable, if someone can hear your threshold miles away you’re doing it all wrong and negating any advantage as well as driving other operators around you nuts.

Best way to go is to set the detectors settings to be smooth and stable, I tend to use conservative Sensitivity/Gain settings along with Volume and Threshold. The Target Volume needs to be kept low to allow the booster to drive the audio without causing distortion, this is especially important on the GPZ 7000. If your detector Target Volume is set to aggressively the booster is then going to amplify that aggressive distorted audio. The threshold needs to be smooth to the ear to start with, if it stutters the amplifier will exacerbate that, if it is too loud it will drown the audio as you boost it.

The B&Z booster is best used for single or twin speakers, it has a very good range of amplification with hardly any distortion. This is especially important because you need to use the booster to adjust the overall audio to suit the ambient noise conditions, in quiet conditions you lower the booster volume so the threshold is not dominating, if its windy then you increase the volume so the threshold can be clearly heard.

The B&Z booster runs on 2 x AAA alkaline batteries which should last up to 3 weeks at 6 to 8 hours per day, it is in a plastic housing to cut down on any excess metal on your body. The B&Z can be used with headphones, to do so the volume of the detector needs to be lowered so the booster volume can be lifted above 2 1/2 to 3 to avoid noise and hiss from the potentiometer, with the GPX and GPZ machines this can be as low as 6 or even lower if required depending on the sensitivity of the headphones being used.

Higher tones tend to require less volume, lower tones more, lower tones (30 and down on Minelab PIs and ZVT) are generally better heard through headphones rather than speakers, this is due to all the natural low frequency noises heard in natural ambient environments, Noise cancelling headphones really compliment low frequency Tones.

The audio of the Minelab GPX and GPZ machines is converted to analogue via the speakers, boosted speakers tend to iron out the steppy digital nature of the Minelab audio, this helps a lot with running less noise floor filtering through the Stabilizer and Audio Smoothing controls, which is were all the edge of detection depth performance lays. The B&Z only ever magnifies the pure audio of the detector with no colouring of the audio through filtering, you only ever hear the “pure” audio intended by the designer of the metal detector. Call me a purist but that’s the way I prefer to hear my detector.

Hope this helps
JP

Thank you JP for a very informative and (to me) understandable response.
I particularly like your reference to the "coarseness" of the GPX adjustments, the way in which digital controls work can make the increments of volume or tone change too large.
This is easily demonstrated by the "click" increments of the target volume, tone etc. from the LCD panel, compared to the smooth analogue control of the threshold volume.
Again, many thanks. Now I have to start thinking about what exists in the "piggy bank".
mike