"My 50-135 has been great from the start. I hadn't heard of any focus
problems. But the DP folks whine about everything so I wouldn't put much
stock in it."
There was a rash of SDM failures with the DA* 50-135. My second sample,
which was optically superb, simply refused one day to focus in any
matter whatsoever. It had no more than about 150 shots on it. This was
last November, when I was in Rome. I used it one afternoon, put it in my
bag, took it out the next day and found that it would not focus by
either SDM or manually. I am careful with my equipment. Others reported
similar experiences at roughtly the same time last fall. I suspect that
one of the early batches got out with something in the SDM prone to fail.
I sent it and my DA* 16-50 to Pentax at the same time. (I discovered
that the 16-50 had extreme right edge weakness at 50 mm.) Both were out
of warranty. I expected to have to buy another 16-50, and to have to pay
for the repair to the 50-135. To my pleasant surprise, Pentax replaced
both lenses at no charge. The new lenses look okay so far, but I have
not had much chance to use them over the winter. That will soon change.
Unless I come down with flu, I expect to leave for China at the end of
the month.
Joe
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