Originally posted by bdery That's one nice offering. I own the previous version, and it's by far my main lens.
I do use the close focusing function a lot, so it's sad that it looses some magnification, but silent AF and a faster aperture at 70 are strong selling points. HSM (as they call it) is irrelevant for us.
Sadly, the Pentax 17-70 looses much of its appeal now. The Sigma, which was already the go-to lens for many people not interested in kit lenses, will probably become quite ubiquitous.
I'm almost sure its price will be similar to the previous version, otherwise it wouldn't make much sense. Maybe a little bit more expensive, but if they overprice it (it's already expensive) they will be making a mistake.
So it loses 2 cm of close focus, gains ~75g on the con side, but has OIS and gains 1/3(?) stop on the long end on the pro side.
I agree about the Pentax 17-70 losing some appeal--they need to WR that sucker! Pentax still has nicer coatings and colour in my opinion, but this is a great range, and some extra speed on the wide end helps.
But it also says that AF is only available on SDM capable bodies, implying that HSM works! (or is supposed to
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