I am not here to defend Whites. The MXS is the first Whites detector I have owned. It has defintiely not blown my socks off. But I just want to reemphasize as the only one posting in this thread besides Treasure_Hunter who has actually used the MX Sport - Even without the "fix" I did not find the MXS to be unusable out of the box whatsoever. The issue in question that needed to be addressed (recovery time under certain conditions) I found to be minor and would not be relevant for much of the situations in which I would use the detector, so in MY experience, this is much ado about little. In fact, I debated as to whether to send it in at all. I ultimately decided that the dust had pretty much settled and there was no real downside, especially since sending the detector in was cost free and would not impact my detecting as it was not my primary detector. I cannot speak to White's QC issues and inventory control methods, but regarding those who have had to repeatedly send in their machines, logic dictates that for a brand new machine (smart phones are notorious for this), even if issues are discovered relatively quickly after release and if you can at all live with them in the mean time, it is never wise to jump on the first firmware fix. That's because the fact that Whites quickly issued the firmware fix is double edged sword. Good responsiveness by Whites to an identified issue, but if there is one issue out there, then most likely there are more to follow and only time will flush those out. Also, it is not uncommon for the first firmware fix to break something else that was NOT broken before the fix. So I intentionally waited until the dust settled before I sent mine in. In my most humble opinion, those who pulled the trigger early and got their machines in for the first fix were just setting themselves up for inevitable disappointment. Not saying they deserved the pain and anguish of having to send their machines back multiple times, but practicing a little patience in these situations is wise, you want give these things time to settle out. Albeit, if they were not the Guinea pigs for Whites issues, then I would not have any barometer to tell me the issue was ultimately being properly addressed by Whites. Not sure if this makes sense, but bottom line, I was not overly concerned about the firmware fix issue in the first place, did not rush to get it, and am glad I waited since it pretty much played out as I had predicted. Again, not defending Whites. They could have played this out differently, such as telling users that they had a fix for the initial issue, but they wanted to wait to see if other issues came to light before they released the final fix or taken the time to regression test the fix before releasing it to be sure they didn't mess something else up. I think, regardless, Whites and the MXS buyers were going to be in a no win situation with this one. Too bad.
Also, FWIW, I own an AT Pro, and still decided to pull the trigger on the Whites MXS (I am only going to end up keeping one of them) because of few nagging issues I have with the AT Pro including physical balance, smallish display that is hard for my old eyes to read, no backlight. I am still not sure the MX Sport surpasses the AT Pro especially at a $200 cost premium, but I do like what the MXS brings to the table on those specific issues. Still need some run time on the MX Sport to determine if performance indeed equals or surpasses the Pro, so the jury is still out. We'll see if the MX Sport comes back from Whites better or worse for wear and ultimately make the call.
