24% discount just showed up.

https://www.adorama.com/px50135afd.html?origterm=pentax+smcp-da+5...hredirect=true

[shardulm]

Great lens by every means. And a great price too. Just hope these have newer/upgraded/updated/goodbatch SDMs on them. I have 2 one with SDM disabled and love both AF noise or no AF noise.
Hands down great optics and a 70-200 equivalent of FF format.

[Eyewanders]

Great lens by every means. And a great price too. Just hope these have newer/upgraded/updated/goodbatch SDMs on them. I have 2 one with SDM disabled and love both AF noise or no AF noise.
Hands down great optics and a 70-200 equivalent of FF format.

Certainly a relatively unsung great. I don't use mine much these days just due to size (and because the DA*300 is practically cemented to my K-3), but back in the day it gave me some of my favorite images.

[brianmquinn]

I never thought it could be worth the price.

I read all the online tests and looked that the numbers.
I thought I already own "XYZ" lens.
My "XYZ" lens resolves "123" lines at "ABC" stop.
So I thought "my current lens is as good if I just stop it down one stop".

I WAS WRONG!

When I finally bought this lens USED on ebay it was the best zoom I owned at ALL STOPS.
It even beat or match some of my primes in it's range.

For example I have:
Super-Takumar 50mm F1.4 (8-element variant)
and
SMC Pentax-FA 43mm F1.9 Limited
and
SMC Pentax-FA 50mm F1.4
and
in the side by side test liked the zoom better (at the 50mm mark)

I have concluded:
There is no way to put into a test report any number that shows how good this lens is.
It easily beats the lenses that are supposed to be better than it when looking at real world photos (NOT TEST CHARTS)

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Last edited by brianmquinn; 05-06-2019 at 07:34 PM. Reason: addition of info