| Author: | | Veteran Member Registered: August, 2012 Posts: 678 | | Review Date: August 21, 2015 | Not Recommended | Price: $31.00
| Rating: 5 |
| Pros: | Sleek, solid, metal construction | | Cons: | no manual focusing ring, autofocus isn't as accurate as it should be | | Sharpness: 6
Aberrations: 7
Bokeh: 4
Handling: 4
Value: 5
Camera Used: K-x, K100D
Autofocus: 4
New Or Used: New
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I really wanted to love this lens, honest I did. But you know what, I'm just not feelin' it. I got it on eBay for $25 plus $6 for shipping and thought I'd gotten a nice, basic 'walkin' around' lens to leave on my K-x. I've been playing with it all week but I'm just not satisfied with its performance. I like it's sleek, metal construction but my all-too-plastic Quantaray 28-90mm f3.5-5.6 Aspherical lens just leaves it in the dust.
The focus on this lens is at best a little on the soft side and tends to want to bring the wrong things into focus. The lens hunts way too much when focusing, even in bright sunlight, and sometimes just seems to give up and focus somewhere in the middle distance, leaving just about everything out of focus. To make matters worse, manual focusing on this lens is essentially nonexistent because there is no manual focusing ring. yeah, there is literally nothing out there to grip onto without a filter screwed into place. Although the zoom ring has a nice rubber grip on it, turning the thing is like trying to parallel park a '55 Oldsmobile with no power steering. It takes an more effort than I feel it should
The images this lens has yielded have been blah at best. Nothing about them grabs the eye. Contrast is flat, bokeh is blah, even when well composed, they just have a lifeless quality to them. compared to images taken with my other lenses.
Just as an experiment, I tried this lens on my K100D, the oldest Pentax body I own, and it actually performs a little better there. The images aren't much better but the autofocus doesn't act up as much. For now I'm leaving this lens paired up with the K100D since I since that camera doesn't get very much use these days and neither will that lens.
UPDATE: I ended up selling this lens at a slight loss after owning it a couple of months and I honestly haven't missed it.
| | | | | | | Site Supporter Registered: October, 2009 Location: Denver, Colorado Posts: 2,030
1 user found this helpful
| | Review Date: June 5, 2013 | Recommended | Price: $50.00
| Rating: 8 |
| Pros: | Sharp for a budget zoom, fast AF | | Cons: | Noisy AF, soft at 70mm wide open | | Sharpness: 8
Aberrations: 8
Bokeh: 7
Handling: 8
Value: 9
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This is a pretty handy medium-range zoom, sharp when stopped down and the AF is reasonably fast and accurate. The Bokeh is slightly nervous and harsh at smaller apertures, smooths out somewhat below f/5.6,but it's never great.
The auto focus, while quick, is very noisy and announces the arrival of sharp focus with a 'bang'. It shares this disconcerting effect with the (much smaller) F 35-70mm Pentax, another medium-range zoom that is a real bargain also.
Both my K10D and K-7 read the Sigma as a Pentax 28-80mm zoom, an annoying but otherwise harmless error.
Construction is good but the zoom ring is a bit wobbly on an otherwise tight barrel. The MF ring is nearly invisible, luckily I haven't needed to use it!
Exposure is nearly perfect throughout the range, a slight tendency to over-expose (about 1/3 stop) occasionally, in certain lighting conditions. I've noticed this with both DSLR bodies, so it seems the fault lies with the lens.
Overall a good low-cost mid zoom, sturdy and reliable, sharp when used properly. For the going price, as good as most consumer or kit-grade zooms from any maker
Ron
| | | | | New Member Registered: July, 2012 Posts: 20
2 users found this helpful
| | Review Date: July 24, 2012 | Recommended | Price: $20.00
| Rating: 8 |
| Pros: | Fully automatic, works on K-r just like any DA lens | | Cons: | Average IQ, similar to the DAL 18-55 | | Sharpness: 8
Aberrations: 8
Bokeh: 9
Handling: 10
Value: 9
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  Got this lens off Ebay for £15 after reading the previous review (Google only found one other review and that was also positive). It came complete with both end caps, the original box and hard leather case and is in very good condition.
I've now taken many shots, using it as my 'carry around lens' on holiday and have been very pleased with the results. I'd say the IQ is just 'average' rather than 'sharp' but certainly as good as the DAL 18-55 kit lens. In good light conditions I might even say it is better than the kit lens producing nice crisp images with very good colour rendering
On the PLUS side, my copy has no problems with auto-focus (so far !) and is as quick and quiet as my DAL lenses so the other reviewer must have been unlucky ?
I bought this lens to replace the 18-55 kit lens as it has that bit more 'tele' reach and have found it excellent in this respect.
Since it appears to function fully like any modern DA/DAL lens I shall continue to use it as a general purpose 'carry around' lens when I don't want to change lenses when I'm out.  | | | | | Junior Member Registered: March, 2007 Location: Cascais, Portugal Posts: 40
2 users found this helpful
| | Review Date: June 24, 2011 | Recommended | Price: None indicated
| Rating: 8 |
| Pros: | Very sharp | | Cons: | Autofocus noisy and unreliable | |
I recently came across this lens at a very good price (12 euro, or +/- 18 dollars. It's in good shape, with only minor body scratches. Glass is clean.
I was surprised with the extreme sharpness of this lens. There isn't much info around about it, but it is very good.
No noticeable vignetting (which isn't surprising, condering it was intended for FF).
Two problems with it:
1 - Autofocus is noisy and nervous and has strong «clacking» sound when it reaches the extremes. Also, and more important, I cannot figure why, but if focused on infinity the autofocus confirmation loight won't stop blinking and, thus, only AF-C is possible, ou manual (which isn't really an option, as the focus ring is all but non-existing...)
2 - My K10D insists on assuming this lens is an SMC-F 28-80... Fortunatelly, I don't have one, so it«'s easy to tell when a picture was taken with it...
I'm impressed with the results in terms of picture quality (almost as good as a prime, very sharp, good contrast and color rendering), but functionality is a bit limited for the reasons I just mentioned. But maybe it's only my copy.
I've taken some shots with it and the Pentax SMC-M 100 / F4 Macro and the results are difficult to tell apart (except foor the different FOV).
Conclusion: for the price paid, I will keep it and use ocasionally.
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