BOOK: Andy Sabisch’s “The Deus Handbook” (INTERNATIONAL EDITION)

Foreword
by Leonardo/”Bodhi3”

Before leaving you to the very interesting article written, in cooperation, by Gianni and Sergio, (once again, I’d like to thank them for their precious work), please allow me to add a brief personal note. I would like to give my personal gratitude, and also from the entire AMD Tech Team, to the XP Detectors and its owner and chief designer, Alain Loubet, that I was happy to interview some weeks ago, who kindly sent us two copies of the handbook.

Andy Sabisch is truly a “celebrity” in the international metal detecting scene. With so many years spent on the fields and on the beaches of the entire Planet, gaining an incredible hunting experience and, obviously, quite a lot of buried treasures, Andy is one of the greatest metal detecting experts and, without any doubt, between the best popularizers of this wonderful hobby. I already had the pleasure to read one of his most famous books “The Minelab E-TRAC and Explorer Handbook” where he explained, with simple words, how to get the most out of those two awesome machines. With a simple and plain language Andy is able to introduce complex concepts helping the readers to deeply understand the detectors’ dynamics in order to obtain the best performances for any kind of field of application.
After the Minelab machines, Andy “fell in love” with the XP’s jewel: the Deus. With a rigorous detail level, Mr. Sabisch presented us a truly valuable handbook so rich in information, so incredibly useful for the beginners and the experts too. I would like to highlight the manual is very updated too, since it talks about even 3.x software realease features  but never forgetting 2.x ones.

In short, a very useful book, written in a simple and flowing english that any Deus owner, who wants to push its performance to the limits, should have on his library.

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BOOK: Andy Sabisch’s “The Deus Handbook”

by Gianni/”Linux-Ubuntu” and Sergio/”Xergix”

The Andy Sabisch’s book arrived in a classic package envelope.  As soon I pulled it out, I was surprised by its size: I was expecting a tiny booklet with some “easy tricks from the detecting guru” but I was amazed to have a true 188-pages full-size-full-quality manual. The book is A4 size with a very nice and thick color cover, while inside images and graphs are in B&W. The print quality is superb, the font is perfectly readable and the image quality is really good. In short, even if it’s not printed on the best paper quality and is in B&W, it looks great and it’s very pleasant to read.

The book is written in English but it is very easy to understand even for foreign readers with enough technical English language skills. Its structure follows the one of any other Sabisch’s books, following a precise track, allowing the reader to “meet the manufacturers”, i.e. talking about the XP Detectors history, leading him to learn the detector parts, its first use and describing its advanced uses and search techniques.

In the first pages, there’s a special memorial dedication to Jogn Burke, a very famous british detectorist died in 2011, very well know as “John Lynn-The Norfolk Wolf” that probably most of your will remember for his website or his famous videotests.
In the following pages you will find a complete index and Andy’s personal thanks to several treasure hunters who gave a contribution to the book. So you will easily understand that all these contributions, together with Andy’s experiences, will have a very important and organic function in this rich and well organized book.

After the first introductory section, you’ll read a technical description of the XP Deus, its technology, the updating features and some very interesting paragraphs about its different operating frequencies put in relation with different targets. Those are basic and fundamental informations to start seriously learning how to use the machine at its best.
A complete description of each Deus software menu will follow. An absent-minded reader could think these page are a useless duplicate of the user guide that comes with the machine. Wrong! Each single menu item is extremely detailed and there are tons of intelligent tips. And it’s such a pleasant surprise to notice that the book is so updated, since it also contains the differences between 2.x and 3.x software release. Great job Andy!

We’ve really appreciated the section about the most interesting parameters, so difficult do be understood by beginners: Reactivity, Iron Volume, TX Power, Silencer etc.. All that stuff you MUST understand very well in order to push the detector to the limits. A very in-depth analysis of the “hidden menus” is also present (Sergio already published a very interesting article in Italian for our blog… here), with over 5 pages and several images.

Then Andy gives us some technical notions about concentric and DD coils, talks about the correct use of the pinpointer and finally bring us to the “Test Garden” and gives us very good informations on discrimination.

A very comprehensive space is dedicated to this last issue. Every issue, every parameter that is tied to discrimination is examined to fully explore audio and visual discrimination including Reactivity and Silencer.

As you’ve already got, the book follows a very precise organization, trying to unveil all the Deus’ secrets, from ABC to its most advanced features. Andy will go along with you from the beginning, helping you to discover the most proper techniques to have a succesful hunting in a variety of situation: from learning how to set the machine on “trashy” fields to how to recognize a hot rock, a iron object or any other “trash” target. A very wide number of pages are dedicated to discrimination techniques, very useful in place like parks and beaches.

In the book you will find several “tuned” programs for coin hunting. Be aware that Andy talks about USA coins, so you may need to tweak them a little to adapt the settings to your Country’s coinage. Andy and his friends also dedicated a lot of time to beach and fresh water hunting, to relics, and gold prospecting too!

Each technique will be illustrated with tips, specific settings, technical explanations and every other possible useful information. Obviously we recommend to think to these settings as a “building block” to create your own personal ones that will fit to your needings.

The handbook also includes sections about incredible  findings, Deus accessories, links and other useful resources.

Andy’s book is the ideal complementary manual to the XP user guide; Some times manufacturers’ user guides are not so clear or pleasant to read. This one will give you a great help to understand the XP one too!!!

A tip from us… Read Andy’s book several times and you will be aware that those “dark concepts”, slowly and easily, will become clearer and clearer and you will be able to master the detector at its best!

In conclusion, we really enjoyed ourself reading this handbook! It was a real pleasure because there’s always something to be learned from other people’s experience. Its a book for everyone, from beginners to experts. Reading will easily flow and will be very fun since Sabisch’s ability to melt his experience to other people’s contribution is legendary. It’s a truly useful help for anyone who wants to learn how to use the machine and it could also be used as a reference guide to refresh some difficult aspects and issues from time to time..

For more information or to buy the book:
http://www.sabischbooks.com/books/xp/

 (Translation from Italian: Leonardo/”Bodhi3″)