Ok, I seem to have started or contributed to a discussion about the merits of 28-80 lenses, which is fine. Ironically, I have used the only 28-85 I own about twice. Until last year I was an all-primes shooter, and still am on the Pentax front.
I singled out this focal length because I was originally looking for a lens to go on my mother's ME Super to replace that awful 28-80 (?) Takumar A lens that somehow came into our possession. It was big, clunky, and practically a soft-focus lens. So, I looked at the long list of comments by PDMLers about lenses in this focal length and found nothing that people raved about, except the 28-80/2.8 (?) which was out of my price range and my mother's shleppage weight. This was distressing as I didn't want to buy a third party lens since they usually focus backwards. On the other hand, it wasn't too suprising as from what I can see most cameras are sold with a 28-80 kind of zoom as the standard lens these days and to keep the package price down the starter lens is usually mediocre at best. It's a far cry from the days of 50/2.0 lenses that you could shave with. I eventually bought the 28-105/3.2-4.5, which I shot with for a week to make sure it wasn't a lemon. It's small, light, and capable. I never actually tested it scientifically to see how it fared compared to the above-mentioned 28-85 (nikkor, an old AIS design in AF clothing) or any of the primes in that range, but I had no reservations giving it to my mother. It's worth noting that I didn't even consider anything with a telephoto end slower than f/4.5, so I might have overlooked some lenses that were fine optically. I've got biases there as all my pro glass is f/2.8 or faster and always has been. DJE
