Hi All, I had a chance to compare these two Pentax 17-70/4 and 16-50/2.8 in action. On two separate occasions, I used them to shoot dance events with and without a flash, using K-7 and K-x. My (very subjective conclusions):
1. 17-70 is much faster and much more accurate in automatic focusing. 2. The image quality from 16-50 was lower than what I was expecting. So, I am not sure if that is because of the particular bad sample of 16-50. There are other variable involved (focusing, low light or P-TTL flash metering). On another hand, I was very impressed by using 50-135/2.8 under the same conditions. I am afraid I am sold on that lens. I found that 17-70 is also a very good performer. I didn't see much of discussion about it on PDML (I might've missed it), so I bought it "being in the dark", but I like it. It's a keeper, and 16-50 goes back. I wish it was 16-70, and an extra aperture step would be great, but oh, well... (Important: For those considering 17-70, - keep in mind that it is SDM-only and has no screw-driver AF; hence it is not compatible with the older AF Pentax DSLRs for AF.) Igor -- PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List [email protected] http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net to UNSUBSCRIBE from the PDML, please visit the link directly above and follow the directions.
