Stuart wrote
>Im not trying to start a flamewar here, just asking people to think
>before you buy..
Perhaps if many of us had done that, we never would have ended up with a
crappy kit lens to begin with. I know when I first bought an Elan IIe after
years of being out of photography (and it's only a hobby for me), I bought
it with the 28-80. I was very disappointed with my first set of slides.
Yes, even I could see the focus was not as sharp as my old manual Pentax,
even without having checked photodo. I was extremely discouraged after
spending so much money (or what I thought was a lot) on what I thought was a
great set-up. So... I began searching the web, reading magazine reviews
and following newsgroups. This led me to the 50mm 1.8, and the 28-135IS.
Both performed noticibly better. I used Photodo to assist in making those
initial decisions after my mistake, and I still refer to it now. While it
is not an "end all," I take it with more than a grain of salt. I have yet
to find a lens that they rate highly not live up to their ratings when I
finally purchase it. I know Photodo doesn't tell you everything, but if
they tell you a lens is a dog, then that's a definite "no buy" for me. As
far as users reviews go, it is interesting to see some of the pro stuff get
rated lower on some of the subjective site (camerareview and
photographyreview) than the consumer grade lenses. I suspect that this is
because pros and ameratures aren't comparing the same lenses... it must
depend on what other lenses they have to compare it to.
All things carry weight, but photodo is the only objective review (not based
on opinion but an actual test) that I know of that has the variety of
manufactorer and number of lenses to do a good comparison. The more
informed we have, the better. If you can tell me of another objective site
based on some sort of actual test, I would greatly appreciate it.
*
****
*******
***********************************************************
* For list instructions, including unsubscribe, see:
* http://www.a1.nl/phomepag/markerink/eos_list.htm
***********************************************************
