Screen Glare. Why do you care?

[kingingkunsan]

I have read a lot of complaints about the E-Trac and the screen display. Mainly the glare and inability for most to be able to read in certain conditions. I am lost as to why they rely on it so heavily in the first place. In my experience many things can change the ID of a target; depth of target, coin on edge vs. flat , type of coil (stock vs. aftermarket, type of soil, soil condition (wet or dry), and on and on. So the need to see the screen has long been something I decided to not rely on. I use it, but not very often.

 

[Dale(Ia)]

I have read a lot of complaints about the E-Trac and the screen display. Mainly the glare and inability for most to be able to read in certain conditions. I am lost as to why they rely on it so heavily in the first place. In my experience many things can change the ID of a target; depth of target, coin on edge vs. flat , type of coil (stock vs. aftermarket, type of soil, soil condition (wet or dry), and on and on. So the need to see the screen has long been something I decided to not rely on. I use it, but not very often.

I "second" that! But that may be just me.........

Iowa Dale

 

[ironsight]

Well some people are die hard Chevy lovers while others are Ford lovers. To each their own.

In junk infested 'hunted out' areas i rely on 'all' the indications my eTRAC gives me to decide on whether to dig or not including tones AND looking at the screen.
I can't tell you how many keepers i found next to 'large' junk by the numbers bouncing between an iffy occasional keeper number but mostly a junk number with the tones saturated denoting junk.... because of the large nearby junk. If i would of relied totally on tones in those cases, i would of walked right over those keepers.

The screen glare IMO should of been designed away long ago.
Even with the debut of the CTX years ago, where Minelab had a golden opportunity to fix it once and for all ....yep its still there.

Detectors costing much much less than these Minelab$ have minimal to no screen glare. Why is that?
Minelab stubbornly does not listen to its customer base. Why should they? Some say they don't need or look at the screen numbers!
The glare has been an issue for years, just do a search here on it. If the sun is just at the right attitude, the glare can even be blinding!

The digital Fe Co scheme IMO is one of the best features of these machines. I paid for it and i'm gonna use it.
That is if the glare isn't bad! lol.

 

[daddyflea]

I have read a lot of complaints about the E-Trac and the screen display. Mainly the glare and inability for most to be able to read in certain conditions. I am lost as to why they rely on it so heavily in the first place. In my experience many things can change the ID of a target; depth of target, coin on edge vs. flat , type of coil (stock vs. aftermarket, type of soil, soil condition (wet or dry), and on and on. So the need to see the screen has long been something I decided to not rely on. I use it, but not very often.

For one thing I want to see how my Detector is setup. Deep On or Off and how much Sensitivity it is running. Hard to see in the field.

 

[kingingkunsan]

Well some people are die hard Chevy lovers while others are Ford lovers. To each their own.

In junk infested 'hunted out' areas i rely on 'all' the indications my eTRAC gives me to decide on whether to dig or not including tones AND looking at the screen.
I can't tell you how many keepers i found next to 'large' junk by the numbers bouncing between an iffy occasional keeper number but mostly a junk number with the tones saturated denoting junk.... because of the large nearby junk. If i would of relied totally on tones in those cases, i would of walked right over those keepers.

The screen glare IMO should of been designed away long ago.
Even with the debut of the CTX years ago, where Minelab had a golden opportunity to fix it once and for all ....yep its still there.

Detectors costing much much less than these Minelab$ have minimal to no screen glare. Why is that?
Minelab stubbornly does not listen to its customer base. Why should they? Some say they don't need or look at the screen numbers!
The glare has been an issue for years, just do a search here on it. If the sun is just at the right attitude, the glare can even be blinding!

The digital Fe Co scheme IMO is one of the best features of these machines. I paid for it and i'm gonna use it.
That is if the glare isn't bad! lol.

Fair point. I honestly had not thought that much into it. You have given me something to ponder for sure. What can we do to inspire Minelab to improve is the next question.

 

[mapper65]

As a new ETRAC owner being able to read the screen until I'm able to hunt first by sound and then use the screen for confirmation is very important. Actually, even after you learn the detector it's pretty important but we have to deal with it if we want to use the detector. I knew going into it that the display was not one of the detector's better features.

My guess is that if Minelab corrected the display visibility midstream with a hardware upgrade it would create a revolt among ETRAC owners. Then you would have that occasional owner that would want to sell off his ETRAC to buy the model with the improved display and that would create an issue for the used market. Good new travels fast on the internet and bad news travels faster. It wouldn't take long for people searching to buy a used ETRAC to realize why people are selling them off and that might make someone in the market to buy a used one consider buying a new one. I doubt that would keep someone from selling their used ETRAC but it would definitely drive the used price down.

On the other hand if Minelab came out with an option for people to have their display upgraded then people would say "why should I have to pay for a new display being that Minelab is admitting this is a design flaw because they came out with a new display". It's really a no win situation for both sides. If an improved display was available for say....$100, I'd probably be all in and I suspect others would be also.

The display readability was obviously not a deal breaker for me because I bought the detector but it does have me scratching my head as to why that wasn't addressed in beta testing. I have a feeling that they had someone come up with that display or they bought the display from a company and proceeded with the design of the detector around the display. They were probably too far into the development of the brains of the detector to try to and start over and work with another display. Hopefully they won't make that mistake again.

 

[ironsight]

Correcting the glare issue in mid stream ain't gonna happen and IMO shouldn't.
I'm convinced Minelab is going to squeeze all the money it can get out of that design as is.
The number one eTRAC complaint is the glare issue, coulda shoulda been corrected with their flagship detector, the CTX.

As big a PITA the glare is to some maybe most on cloudless sunny days, the eTRAC compensates by finding keepers other detectors walk over.
All one has to do is look at the amount and frequency of finds on this forum compared to the other detector finds and its arguably clear the eTRAC has the edge.
On those sunny days, i'm forced to search in a shady area or sweep in another direction out of the sun's glare.
I keep searching glare or not as there are ways around the glare.

Which is why some of us beach about the glare but keep on using the venerable eTRAC, myself included.
As i said earlier, i use all the clues the eTRAC provides on whether to dig or not including tones and FeCo digital info.

What Minelab should but i'm convinced won't do is release an updated eTRAC-II as they did similar with the Explorer:
-update the screen with a hi contrast display with a non reflective lens.
-faster processor.
-ability to add custom tones to FeCo zones similar to the CTX.
-ability to easily adjust sensitivity setting while in Quick Mask.
-on and on, search the numerous past threads here on an updated eTRAC.

 

[Dale(Ia)]

Correcting the glare issue in mid stream ain't gonna happen and IMO shouldn't.
I'm convinced Minelab is going to squeeze all the money it can get out of that design as is.
The number one eTRAC complaint is the glare issue, coulda shoulda been corrected with their flagship detector, the CTX.

As big a PITA the glare is to some maybe most on cloudless sunny days, the eTRAC compensates by finding keepers other detectors walk over.
All one has to do is look at the amount and frequency of finds on this forum compared to the other detector finds and its arguably clear the eTRAC has the edge.
On those sunny days, i'm forced to search in a shady area or sweep in another direction out of the sun's glare.
I keep searching glare or not as there are ways around the glare.

Which is why some of us beach about the glare but keep on using the venerable eTRAC, myself included.
As i said earlier, i use all the clues the eTRAC provides on whether to dig or not including tones and FeCo digital info.

What Minelab should but i'm convinced won't do is release an updated eTRAC-II as they did similar with the Explorer:
-update the screen with a hi contrast display with a non reflective lens
-faster processor.
-ability to add custom tones to FeCo zones similar to the CTX.
-ability to easily adjust sensitivity setting while in Quick Mask.
-on and on, search the numerous past threads here on an updated eTRAC.

I'll second that, Ironsight! You expressed my thoughts on this subject exactly! When I dig a dime at 10-12", even with it's faults, I know I'm using the right machine for me!!!

Iowa Dale

 

[kingingkunsan]

Correcting the glare issue in mid stream ain't gonna happen and IMO shouldn't.
I'm convinced Minelab is going to squeeze all the money it can get out of that design as is.
The number one eTRAC complaint is the glare issue, coulda shoulda been corrected with their flagship detector, the CTX.

As big a PITA the glare is to some maybe most on cloudless sunny days, the eTRAC compensates by finding keepers other detectors walk over.
All one has to do is look at the amount and frequency of finds on this forum compared to the other detector finds and its arguably clear the eTRAC has the edge.
On those sunny days, i'm forced to search in a shady area or sweep in another direction out of the sun's glare.
I keep searching glare or not as there are ways around the glare.

Which is why some of us beach about the glare but keep on using the venerable eTRAC, myself included.
As i said earlier, i use all the clues the eTRAC provides on whether to dig or not including tones and FeCo digital info.

What Minelab should but i'm convinced won't do is release an updated eTRAC-II as they did similar with the Explorer:
-update the screen with a hi contrast display with a non reflective lens.
-faster processor.
-ability to add custom tones to FeCo zones similar to the CTX.
-ability to easily adjust sensitivity setting while in Quick Mask.
-on and on, search the numerous past threads here on an updated eTRAC.

The glare issue would not be corrected mid stream. The glare issue has been around since the Explorer. The E-trac and the Explorer control housing are very similar in design and both suffer the same glare issue. I agree with most that have stated that Minelab could have and should have improved it like other manufactures have. But for some reason Minelab decided not to address the issue. If and when Minelab releases an E-trac II they would make the right choice by addressing the issue. On this note I have not read anything about the potential release of an E-trac II. And before I close, I want to re-state, I do not rely on the display for most of my detecting because of the glare. I have trained myself to use the machine without using the display. But should I have to? After reading all these comments it has me re-thinking my strategy and performance with the machine.

 

[mapper65]

I don't think any of us are knocking the detector from a quality standpoint and the abilities that it has in your hands once we've mastered it. I think we're just in the day and age that a display should never be one of the things that is a questionable drawback to a product and that's what's disappointing. I really don't think we'll see another sketchy display in a Minelab product going forward....hopefully not "It is what it is" as they say.

Well, I think we've beat a dead horse long enough.

 

[ironsight]

Mapper, keep on beating this here dead horse. The more the merrier!
If enough users beat that glarry dead horse here on this public forum, maybe just maybe the Minelab suits will get it through their stubborn thick noggins that the glare issue needs to go away. Preferably in an updated eTRAC-II. But i'm not gonna hold my breath.

 

[daddyflea]

Here you give it the Blues

 

[floodplaindetector]

Let me kick the horse a little too. I Like your cartoon daddyflea.
The biggest reason I like to see the screen is to see the depth before I dig on deeper targets so I can guage when I will get to them. The shallower ones I can tell by sound but some of the deeper targets may
be harder to distinguish between moderate or extreme depth depending on how they are masked. I also like to watch what sensitivity I am running at in auto +3.
on the flip side maybe the bad screen trains etrac users to find more because they master its great audio better.


Here is the email response I received from Minelab Americas Business development director last week

Dave,
Thank you for your inquiry and comments. I will be glad to forward to our engineering department. At this time, there are no plans in the near future for a new ETRAC model or replacement.
You are not alone, as we have many loyal ETRAC users throughout the world, so I would not say that there is no chance for an update.

I will definitely make sure your comments are received. Feel free to contact me at any time if you have further questions or comments

 

[Mcdetect]

Couldn't you just apply some anti-glare film over the display? Glare usually doesn't bother me too much since I can usually just approach the target from a different direction to avoid the glare...as a rule I check for signal repeatability at 90 degrees anyhow before digging. There are some days where I get the blinding flashes when the sun reflects just right and I don't like that but I generally can start searching in a different direction to avoid that too. Or wear sunglasses.

I haven't tried anti glare film yet.

 

[mapper65]

Couldn't you just apply some anti-glare film over the display? Glare usually doesn't bother me too much since I can usually just approach the target from a different direction to avoid the glare...as a rule I check for signal repeatability at 90 degrees anyhow before digging. There are some days where I get the blinding flashes when the sun reflects just right and I don't like that but I generally can start searching in a different direction to avoid that too. Or wear sunglasses.

I haven't tried anti glare film yet.

For me it's more like a contest issue than glare. I've lowered my contrast some and it's helped a little.

 

[ironsight]

....The biggest reason I like to see the screen is to see the depth before I dig on deeper targets so I can guage when I will get to them.....

Thanks for that floodplain, don't know how i forgot the depth gauge as a lot of my past posts have been about the importance of it especially for digging up deep iffy targets. Also adding to my forgetfullness, haven't done much detecting lately, too much BS and projects going on last season and now just when all that is winding down... its frozen ground Winter.

That depth gauge is your best friend for finding deep iffy keepers along with tones and yes screen info.
To disregard any one of those 3 clues the eTRAC is screaming is to likely walk over some keepers.

 

[kgramlich]

I have the glare problem on Xterra 705 also so when I use it I take out the little screw that holds the head on and turn about 15"degrees to the left and leave it that way..Why can't they just do that the etrac??

 

[Grunter]

Some one posted on the CTX forum that they took the enviromental hood off of the top of their screen and placed it on the bottom and it reduced the glare.

 

[Nock]

There are times when I want load a different discrimination Patton
Just checking my batterypower level is a problem at times
Or the sensitivity to mention a few