I will give you some info on it. The XS was made around 1995 and they changed them in 1997 for the XS2. The XS has the plug in battery pack that is rechargeable and had a adapter with wires on it to pug into 2 4 cell AA battery packs for alkaline battery's for the spare. Myself I found the XS one of my favorite Sovereigns and seem to be well built even though it may not look it. There was no meter on these and go by the different tones it give for different targets, but many of us added a meter to them to see those close tones our ears can not tell the difference in. It is made to swing slower as you want to hear any different tone changes and some have a problem getting used to it over other detectors. It hates iron even at the lowest disc settings so it seems to be a great coin and jewelry detector. There is a learning curve some give up before they learn it with the different tones, those of us that took the time to learn them love the Sovereigns and do very well in many of those area others claimed are worked out as by going slower we can hear those coin close to iron or other targets.
As far as the coil go, the 8 inch was a solid white one that has Coinsearch on the sticker on the XS and many of us claimed it was the best coil to learn the Sovereign with, but this coil is not waterproof as the later open coil. The 12 inch Sun Ray there is 2 different tone with one a while solid coil that was the earlier one that was a little heavy and it too was not waterproof. The later 12 inch coil was a black open coil that was waterproof. Both does well, but the later model black one is the one everyone wants, so there for a while the older white ones were selling for around $50 or so while the black one used were going for around $140-$160.
As far are they cracked up to be what some say, I would say they are to those that spend the time to learn them, but those that don't spend the time to get to know them and feel they should be digging only great stuff they will not like them that much. Those that get to know them will be impressed at what this detector can do, you just got to use your head more as it will give you so much info and let you the operator decide what to dig and what to walk away from.
Rick
