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WOW!

These won't last long, I'm sure. $499 for the awesome and rare Sigma 50-150 F2.8 EX DC HSM II.
50-150mm F2.8 EX DC HSM II Refurbished | Sigma

Last time it was offered in the Sigma Outlet Store was for $559.

As discussed here in this thread:
https://www.pentaxforums.com/forums/pentax-price-watch/195883-refurbished-si...nses-sale.html

And Edgar does an excellent write-up of this lens here:

https://www.pentaxforums.com/forums/lens-sample-photo-archive/196246-sigma-5...es-thread.html
https://www.pentaxforums.com/forums/pentax-slr-lens-discussion/128533-sigma-...lots-pics.html

Run, don't walk, to buy this great zoom lens at an amazing price!

[selar]

I missed this last time - they wont ship to Australia. Determined not to miss it this time around, I organised a freight forwarder. Sounds a bit dodgy, this freight forwarding business, you sign up on a website, they give you an address and phone number, You get the lens posted to the address of a website half way around the world, and pray for the best. Desperate measures.

[Weevil]

I missed this last time - they wont ship to Australia. Determined not to miss it this time around, I organised a freight forwarder. Sounds a bit dodgy, this freight forwarding business, you sign up on a website, they give you an address and phone number, You get the lens posted to the address of a website half way around the world, and pray for the best. Desperate measures.

I am not sure that would work, because you also need a billing addres in the USA (I am from Canada, and I tried with my credit card + a shipping address in USA, and it doesnt work). I even called them directly and no go! Unless you have someone that has a credit card in the USA and want to buy it for you (I was close to ask someone in the forum to buy it for me this weekend, but I resisted ;-)

[Edgar_in_Indy]

I have one of the refurbs for sale on eBay with worldwide shipping starting at $499 USD with no reserve:

Sigma EX APO DG HSM II 50 150mm F 2 8 Lens for Pentax Equiv to 70 200mm 50 135mm | eBay

And there's also somebody in the Marketplace selling a used one in Australia for $690 AUD:

https://www.pentaxforums.com/forums/photographic-equipment-sale/217108-sale-s...ping-aust.html

[seventysixersfan]

So if I were in the market for such a lens, I would jump at the chance to buy a 50-150mm. I would certainly pay more for a used Sigma 50-150mm than I would for a used Pentax 50-135mm. And I think the 50-135mm goes for between $700 and $800 used. So I think that anybody who got one of these (basically new) 50-150mm's for $500 got a screaming deal. I'm not surprised at all that they sold out as fast as they did. I'm just surprised that Sigma listed them so cheaply.

I was waiting for you to weigh in on this thread, Edgar! You are the best promoter of the virtues of this lens! (Certainly, it influenced my decision to get one) Thanks for your observations and opinions--I wholeheartedly agree! Good luck with your eBay sale!

[seventysixersfan]

I missed this last time - they wont ship to Australia. Determined not to miss it this time around, I organised a freight forwarder. Sounds a bit dodgy, this freight forwarding business, you sign up on a website, they give you an address and phone number, You get the lens posted to the address of a website half way around the world, and pray for the best. Desperate measures.

I do hope this works out for you. But the unorthodox and risky steps that you took to try to get this lens speaks loudly to the demand for it, especially at this price. Best of luck; let us know what happens!

[zdwagner]

Just to let everyone know, I just received my lens hood from Sigma that I ordered last week. The reason this is pertinent is that they didn't tell me it shipped and I received no tracking number. It just showed up. I'm assuming the lens will do the same.

Cheers!

[Edgar_in_Indy]

I received an email from UPS notifying me when it was mailed and giving me the tracking number. But I think that's just because I have a UPS account and I get alerts when something is being sent to me.

[Edgar_in_Indy]

I was waiting for you to weigh in on this thread, Edgar! You are the best promoter of the virtues of this lens! (Certainly, it influenced my decision to get one) Thanks for your observations and opinions--I wholeheartedly agree!

I think one of the reasons this lens was discontinued was that it initially received some bad press right out of the gate, so a lot of people were instantly turned off. When I discovered the lens, the first thing I did was do a Google search for reviews. To this day, if you do a search for Sigma 50-150mm HSM II review the first result that comes up is still the bad review from The-Digital-Picture.com, which is basically a "hit piece" on the lens.

They were reviewing the lens in Canon mount, and the three copies they tried all severely front-focused on their camera. There had obviously been some kind of glitch in the initial calibration for the Canon mounts, at least in an early batch of the lenses. But instead of contacting Sigma about the issue or calibrating the lens or retesting the lens a little later down the road, they just went forward with the review and concluded that the lens was basically a bad buy. (I suppose this was in the days before most camera bodies had options to fine-tune the autofocus of lenses.) They also claimed that the lens was soft, which is in stark contradiction to most of the other professional reviews I have found.

So when I discovered how great this lens really is, and how wrong that initial review was, I kind of made it a mission to let people know what a gem the 50-150mm really was. This was before the lens was tragically discontinued. And I'm not alone, since most user reviews of the lens, regardless of mount, praise it for its sharpness, image quality, autofocus performance, and handling. It's just too bad that Sigma didn't do more to promote the lens.

Someone else suggested that perhaps these "refurbished" lenses are actually versions that were made in other mounts but were never sold, and that Sigma converted them to Pentax mount. I wouldn't be surprised if that was the case. After that bad review, you'd have to be crazy to buy the lens for your Canon or Nikon. So I expect there probably were a lot of Canon and Nikon versions that were never sold. And now that IS is prevalent in most Canon and Nikon telephotos, they probably would have had to basically give them away to sell these unstablized lenses to Canon and Nikon users.

[TropicalMonkey]

I received an email from UPS notifying me when it was mailed and giving me the tracking number. But I think that's just because I have a UPS account and I get alerts when something is being sent to me.

When did you placed the order? I submitted the order by about 5 PM CST and have not received any notification in my ups account yet!

[Edgar_in_Indy]

When did you placed the order? I submitted the order by about 5 PM CST and have not received any notification in my ups account yet!

I think I placed the order on Sunday morning. I got the notification from UPS shortly after midnight last night. When I run the tracking number, it shows that the package first entered the UPS tracking system on Monday afternoon.

"UPS My Choice" is the service that gives me the automatic delivery notifications.

[TropicalMonkey]

I think I placed the order on Sunday morning. I got the notification from UPS shortly after midnight last night. When I run the tracking number, it shows that the package first entered the UPS tracking system on Monday afternoon.

"UPS My Choice" is the service that gives me the automatic delivery notifications.

Hmm... I ordered on Friday and never received any notification. I have the same My UPS service (not the paid, the free one). I received an order confirmation email soon after submitting the order. I will just wait and see.

[seventysixersfan]

Edgar-- you're also an excellent advocate for the Tamron 28-75. I can't tell you how many times I've thought about acquiring that lens on the basis of your photos and arguments for the lens. Thanks!

[Edgar_in_Indy]

Edgar-- you're also an excellent advocate for the Tamron 28-75. I can't tell you how many times I've thought about acquiring that lens on the basis of your photos and arguments for the lens. Thanks!

Yeah, the Tamron 28-75mm is one of the deciding factors that kept me from switching systems entirely to Micro Four Thirds when the OM-D came out. I was tempted by the small body and the beautiful compact lenses, but the Tamron 28-75mm, as well as my Sigma 50-150mm f2.8 and 100-300mm f4, made it impossible for me to leave Pentax. Those are all super-lenses!

The Tamron was the first upgrade lens I ever bought, and to this day I still consider it to be some of the best money I have spent in my life, ever. If I was forced to only be able to use one of my current lenses for the rest of my life, it would be the 28-75mm without a doubt.

[jeffshaddix]

Nice deal! Have they ever done this with the Sigma 100-300/4 APO DG EX? That's the discontinued unit I'd jump for...

[Douge]

I am not sure that would work, because you also need a billing addres in the USA (I am from Canada, and I tried with my credit card + a shipping address in USA, and it doesnt work). I even called them directly and no go! Unless you have someone that has a credit card in the USA and want to buy it for you (I was close to ask someone in the forum to buy it for me this weekend, but I resisted ;-)

Curious:
Did you try to put your shipping and billing address as the US address?