Minelab CTX 3030

Brand: Minelab Equinox 900

Minelab's flagship since 2012, the CTX 3030 still holds its ground on wet salt sand. It runs FBS 2 multi frequency, transmitting from 1.5 kHz to 100 kHz at once, and Smartfind 2 discrimination puts ferrous and conductive values together on a full colour LCD. The coil, control box and Li-ion battery are all sealed, so the machine is submersible to 3 m (10 ft): surf hunting and shallow wading are fair game. Built-in GPS logs finds and tracks, and the wireless WM 12 module carries audio without a cable.

Weight is the catch, 5.2 lbs with the battery in, and a full day of swinging tells. It pays off for beach hunters who use the 35 by 50 ferrous and conductive target patterns and GPS mapping. Anyone after a light budget starter should look elsewhere: the price sits near $1,999 at Minelab USA and higher for coil bundles. Waterproof headphones cost extra, and the custom socket rules out ordinary ones.