Originally posted by Jonathan Mac Why would you have preferred the first version, may I ask? This piqued my interest as that's the version I have, not that I'm suggesting a swap. I would expect later versions to be better.
*snip*
I remember reading some tests on a photography magazine of the time, and the conclusion was that the 1st series - the one with the zoom ring divided in two sectors and the focusing ring divided into four - was the better of the bunch, and subsequent changes in the optical formula worsened the performance of the "DG" (purportedly optimized for digital) and HSM (even worse, probably due to mass constraints imposed by the focusing mechanism).
I'm completely satisfied with my copy though, so that's probably just nit-picking