| Author: | | Veteran Member Registered: October, 2006 Location: NJ USA Posts: 13,072 | | Review Date: March 18, 2008 | Recommended | Price: $215.00
| Rating: 9 |
| Pros: | Very sharp and fast vintage zoom | | Cons: | some barrel distortion at 35mm, some slop in focus ring on my sample | |
I've had this lens since '85, and over that time it has been my most used lens, the Pentax mount is the third mount I've used with it.
I really like this zoom, it is very sharp and has OK contrast, with good color. The 2.8-3.8 max aperture is a boon. The lens balances well on camera, and is easy to focus (though you do have to twist... and twist... to get the close focus). I never tire of the zoom automatically zooming out as the focus gets closer. The CF designation refers to this 'continuous focus' feature.
There is a bit of barrel distortion at the wide end, an effect I happen to like, it gives me some creative options. On my sample, ever since new, there is a bit of slop in the focus ring, nothing annoying, but it is not the silky smoothness you get with other lenses.
V.s. modern day lenses, I've done some controlled testing against the 16-45 Pentax. To my surprise, I think the Tamron actually resolves more than the Pentax. The Pentax on the other hand gives a more contrasty, concentrated rendering, and of course is auto focus and a true wide angle on a dSLR body.
The cost of adaptall mounts for Pentax K is an issue, which may make this lens impractially expensive today. However, if you already have the adaptall, these seem to go fairly cheaply these days, and then it can be a good buy. Think of this as the ancestor to the current 2.8 Tamron XR DI, it really is a good piece of glass.
Jan'09 - update: my daughter loves this lens, it is her choice for portrait work on the K100D.
| | | | | | | Veteran Member Registered: November, 2008 Location: North Carolina , USA Posts: 2,271 | | Review Date: July 6, 2009 | Recommended | Price: $50.00
| Rating: 9 |
| Pros: | sharp, well built ,great macro capabillity, bokeh | | Cons: | a little soft at35mm | |
Well built old lens with great IQ. Focal length is slightly limitting on the wide end but overall a good carry lens for a day a the the beach or walk in the woods. This has become the lens that stays on my camera most of the time and is part of my 3 lens carry kit. I put this lens through it's paces toe to toe with my Pentax A 35-105 f3.5 and although the colors are slightly more subdued overall IQ was as good and macro capabillity is better. The down side is that this has become a sought after and therefore pricey lens on the used market and if you don't allready own a PK/A adapter you can get more bang for the buck elsewhere
| | | | | Inactive Account Registered: June, 2009 Location: Santa Cruz Mountains Posts: 53 | | Review Date: July 11, 2009 | Recommended | Price: $40.00
| Rating: 9 |
| Pros: | Compact + great Macro | | Cons: | none | |
It really has RARE performance for a zoom,most notably in macro. With the SP2X you can do 1:1 macro...yet you also get a sharp lens at the "landscape"35mm and the 'portrait" 80 mm...or a rather fast "street"walkabout.
On mine...the tab to change mounts was busted so I need a paper clip to swap mounts. my KEEPERS are M42 and K mount..but a sideline is buying +selling film gear...and I CAN put this on just about ANY camera in the house.
I have the 28-90SP and a bigger 28-135 SP tat are NICE..but this puppy is the fastest/smallest/best macro.
Got the SP 60-300 and a YS Sigma 135 1.8....which also can do PK or M42.
I liked the Tammy 35-80 enough I put my Pentax 35-70 AF up for sale. Not that hot for AF..really. Have the Tammy 28 2.5...sweet,but want the 24 mm version.
| | | | | Veteran Member Registered: March, 2009 Location: Salt Lake City, UT Posts: 509 | | Review Date: February 5, 2010 | Recommended | Price: $70.00
| Rating: 8 |
| Pros: | high resolution; compact, well made, good macro | | Cons: | flare, flare, flare | | Sharpness: 9
Aberrations: 7
Bokeh: 8
Handling: 9
Value: 9
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I do not own many zoom lenses (about 10 or so). This one perhaps is one of the highest in terms of resolution. The macro function rivals the real ones. The zoom range is OK(2.2X). Aperture is large for a zoom lens. The lens is very well built. The adaptall thing is a magic and certainly an engineering marvel.
So what is the issue. Flare. Flare. Flare. It reduces contrasts substantially. It is perhaps one of the worse ones in my arsenal. If you ever point to a light source, you would know. Perhaps too many elements in the lens? Perhaps it lacks SMC coating. Perhaps that is why lens makers are using AL elements to reduce the number of glasses. That is why prime lenses are still popular. But it would not be a problem for most macro scenes.
Moreover, Largest aperture is very sensitive to lighting and the shooting situations. Chromatic Aberration is evident. Resolution also suffers. But it is no worse than most third party lenses of the era.
It sometimes does not work perfectly with my Kx. It shows f2.8 even at the 80mm end. It does not always work well with the Anti-shake function, since the focal length is fixed. Over-exposure and under-exposure are not uncommon. Not sure why however.
Contrast is not as high as Pentax ones. The color is not as good as Pentax primes. Saturation can be increased a bit to partially compensate for the problem. Zoom and Focusing rings can feel tricky sometimes.
Finally, it is optimized for close distance. BE careful about this in the field.
| | | | | | | Junior Member Registered: December, 2007 Location: central kansas Posts: 27 | | Review Date: February 24, 2010 | Recommended | Price: $50.00
| Rating: 9 |
| Pros: | Very sharp and contrasty. | | Cons: | None that I have observed. | |
This was another of my eBay purchases. Bought this one from someone in Sweden. Great price and it is flawless. It is almost the equal of my Pentax-F 50mm f/1.7 at that focal length. Just can't find enough good things to say about it, except that it is manual focus.
I have taken some sunrise shots and have seen a little more flare than in a fixed focal length lens, but for a zoom this is a really great lens. I highly recommend it.
| | | | | Veteran Member Registered: February, 2010 Location: Stockholm Posts: 634
1 user found this helpful
| | Review Date: April 8, 2010 | Recommended | Price: $25.00
| Rating: 9 |
| Pros: | Sharp and fast zoom. Nice sharp macro and smooth bokeh. | | Cons: | No Auto Fokus. | |
I found this in a very bad shape at a flee-market for 10usd.
The Zoom was almost stuck and it was hard to see the numbers cause it was so dirty but I bought it as a fun thing to try to fix.
After taking it apart, cleaning it and back together again I did some test shots and was blown away by its sharpness and smooth bokeh.
The macro capabillities is another big bonus and for portraits it has been great too.
I keep putting it back on my Kx even though I have so many other choices that have autofokus or better macro or weighs half of what this one does.
As for now this one is the best lens I have for most situations I find myself in.
If I need a zoom or better macro I have to use something else but for everyday photos its great.
I just whish that the Kx had the old fokus style so it would be easier to use.
Focusing is quite hard and I seem to always fokus slightly behind but thats not the lens. Thats me 
If you see it. GET IT.
Update: I like this one so much I had to get a second copy.... 
My first copy had some problems with the Aparture lever that I couldnt fix.
I found someone selling a copy with an Adaptall M42 mount for 25usd so I bought that one and it was in much better shape then my old one. Ill keep the old one for parts 
Here are a couple of images I took with my first copy last weekend.
I had to edit the pictures to get a width of 800 to fit the forum and in the process I added some sharpness to parts of the images + level adjustments.
I love the bokeh and soft, dreamy feeling I get with this lens.
 | | | | | Forum Member Registered: July, 2010 Location: Sydney Posts: 77 | | Review Date: August 7, 2010 | Recommended | Price: $100.00
| Rating: 9 |
| Pros: | Sharp, contrasty, light, fast.... | | Cons: | rotating front element, zoom ring can stick with poorly maintained copies | |
An excellent performer for an older standard zoom. Starts a little long on my DSLR but all in all 35-80mm is a good range! My manager was once a wedding photographer, and says he used to swear by this one back in the day...
The cam changes direction when zooming, which as the lens ages can cause it to stick at that point. Appart from that ergonomics are pretty nice! I love the big spherical front element as well!
The rotating front element is an issue, but I never use it for landscapes so don't have a PL filter for this one.
As with all adaptall lenses on Pentax it really depends if you have the PKA mount. If you do, you don't lose much funcitonality.
Its fast, very very sharp, and its nice to walk around with older class on your lens sometimes! For an old zoom this one really does come up with the goods.
| | | | | New Member Registered: April, 2011 Location: Dorset , UK Posts: 6 | | Review Date: April 11, 2011 | Recommended | Price: None indicated
| Rating: 8 |
| Pros: | Very sharp at 80mm f5.8/f8 | | Cons: | less good overall at 35mm | |
Done more test on this lens,using a lens chart.
This is a zoom lens,quite a few years old and manual focus,nevertheless if you are looking at portrait or macro lens for your Pentax digitial camera I would go for this one ! AT 80mm and f5.6/f8 and down to f16 this is super sharp,especially at closer focussing distance which is really unusual.
I use it almost like a fixed lens at 80mm.
At wider angles (35-50mm) it needs also closing down but doesnt deliver quite the same resolution.Its still more than usable,just not as sharp as at 80mm.
Image quality at 80mm = 10
at 35-50mm = 5
build = 9
= 8 overall (for me)
| | | | | Loyal Site Supporter Registered: January, 2008 Location: Paris, TN Posts: 3,350 | | Review Date: May 22, 2011 | Recommended | Price: $120.00
| Rating: N/A |
| Pros: | Consistent performer, sharp across all FLs | | Cons: | little protection for front element | |
I've accumulated two of these over the years. A good description would be 'consistently above average to excellent in all respects'.
Just for fun, I ran both lenses through the full range of apertures at 35, 40, 60, 70 and 80 mm and at three distances. (Thanks to digital photography this becomes both practicable and economically feasible today.)
From f 5.6 to f 11 and 40~70mm about the only practical variation in the image is what's dependent on the general optical laws for aperture and focal length. There's noticeable fall-off in sharpness and contrast at the extremes but no more than expected and often less. At 35mm/f 2.8 the lens still appears relatively sharp but there is a noticeable luminous 'bloom' that softens the overall image.
IMO, this is one of the very best Adaptall SP lenses and equally suitable for both film and digital bodies. With 10 - 36mm of extension tubes it serves quite well for close-up and near macro photography in the field but isn't quite up to the standard of the various Tamron90mm macro lenses as an all around macro solution.
I use the O-ME 53 optical viewfinder and a micro-prism split image screen and never miss auto-focus with this lens.
H2
| | | | | Junior Member Registered: January, 2012 Posts: 38 | | Review Date: March 31, 2013 | Recommended | Price: $25.00
| Rating: 10 |
| Pros: | IQ, build quality, easy to focus | | Cons: | relatively prone to flare | | Sharpness: 9
Aberrations: 9
Bokeh: 9
Handling: 9
Value: 10
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This lens is really nice, it feels very nice,
IQ seems good. I tried some shots at best f/stop and they don't seem too bad
http://www.flickr.com/photos/94523933@N02/8606412464/in/photostream
No post processing applied.
Nowadays, it costs next to nothing. The price paid included also a nice film camera, an unused flash, a bag...
Ciao,
Stefano
| | | | | Pentaxian Registered: April, 2011 Location: Lost in translation ... Posts: 18,076 | | Review Date: December 21, 2013 | Recommended | Price: None indicated
| Rating: 10 |
| Pros: | IQ, build, size/range, f2.8 ... | | Cons: | Flare ... | | Sharpness: 9
Aberrations: 8
Bokeh: 9
Handling: 9
Value: 10
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Bonjour,
A great AD-2 lens that I am now happy to have... Purchased at the annual Tours, France, expo/swap meet with a somewhat aged and battered original case, an original front cap, an FD mount with end cap, plus a Vivitar filter ... it was a good deal for the price.
All test shots thus far have been quite good and the "01A" is living up to its reputation in my books. Need to do more test shoots outdoors when the weather clears up a bit ... thus,more samples to come, but here's a p0rn shot on the K-5 with a PKA adapter ...
Allez et salut, John le Green Frog
| | | | | New Member Registered: February, 2012 Posts: 17 | | Review Date: May 27, 2014 | Recommended | Price: $40.00
| Rating: 8 |
| Pros: | Fast, sharp, very well made, handles well, very good close up, hardly ever any CA | | Cons: | No so good out-doors towards infinity; flare? | | Sharpness: 9
Aberrations: 9
Bokeh: 8
Handling: 9
Value: 9
Camera Used: Samsung GX20, Pentax K-x
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I have had this lens (purchased with a PK/M adapter attached for £23 on eBay) for 6 months now, and have tried hard to like it, but I'm still unsure.
The Good
No aberrations to speak of, colours like the Pentax kit lenses close up, rich yet natural, really good contrast, excellent Macro mode. Sharp from wide open and easy to focus at all focal lengths, the 01A gets obviously sharper as it goes longer (and slower). Indoors, and in and around my pocket-handkerchief back garden, I have nothing to complain about.
The Not So Good
Outdoors, at distances from a few metres upwards, the colours seem to get washed out. I would have said it was flare, and flare is certainly an issue when the sun is close to the frame, but even using a deep screw-in rubber hood and with the sun behind me, the colours are less pleasing than in pictures taken with the Pentax FA 28-105mm f4-5.6 Powerzoom. This isn't the case indoors, or close-up outdoors. No question but that the images are still super sharp, pixel by pixel, but when the images should have saturated colours they seem to lack something. It's not noticeable when the subject is more or less monochrome, such as the courtyard at Somerset House in London, but next door, Kings College London, where there is greenery and brickwork as well, it's obvious.
Bokeh is not obtrusive but nothing special.
The older Tamron Adaptall QZ-35M is technically inferior in almost every respect, and it is harder to focus accurately, but it makes the townscapes look retro whilst the 01A tends to make them look as though I shouldn't have bothered to take the picture in the first place! The QZ-35M also boasts an A/M switch, so Aperture Priority works without a PK/A adapter.
I prefer the Pentax-M 35-70mm f2.8-3.5 outdoors also. And it is faster than the 01A for the most part. But there is no possibility of Aperture Priority, it doesn't go as long (though the claimed 80mm for the 01A is more like 75mm), and it lacks the excellent macro capability of the 01A.
I tend to take the 01A rather than the Cosina 28-105mm f2.8-3.8; this is down to the smaller size and superior handling of the Tamron 01A, and its macro mode.
The Tamron 18-50mm f2.8 AF is better, period, over the range it has in common with the 01A, if the focus is right.
To conclude, the 01A is excellent in an intimate setting, but I won't be taking it hiking in the great out-doors.
You might think an 8 is rather harsh considering the individual scores above, and the scores I have given some other lenses, but I'm marking it down for the flare.
| | | | | Site Supporter Registered: May, 2015 Location: Hampshire Posts: 892 | | Review Date: December 22, 2016 | Recommended | Price: $30.00
| Rating: 9 |
| Pros: | Close focussing, fast, changeable mounts. | | Cons: | Gets a little stiff when zooming through FL's | | Sharpness: 9
Aberrations: 8
Bokeh: 8
Handling: 8
Value: 10
Camera Used: K-5
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A great purchase, came with a Contax/Yashica mount but the "Adaptall" means I can fit my P-KA adapter on it.
I compared it to my recent purchase of a Pentax-M 35-70mm F2.8-3.5 and was just as pleased with the images it provides. The "A" setting makes it slightly easier to use and it is much closer focussing and with a little extra length on the long end. Build quality and cosmetic appearance seem to favour the Pentax as might be expected.
Others have mentioned some downsides in their reviews but I cannot help liking it. My one downside is the zoom ring gets a bit stiff when zooming between the ends of the focal lengths. Maybe it will free up a bit with use...or get worse.
As usual, a good SP lens at a great price!
| | | | | New Member Registered: February, 2017 Posts: 3 | | Review Date: March 15, 2017 | Recommended | Price: None indicated
| Rating: 10 |
| Pros: | Sharpness, sharpness, sharpness | | Cons: | none so far | | Sharpness: 10
Aberrations: 9
Bokeh: 9
Handling: 10
Value: 10
Camera Used: Nikon D3
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An absolutely "stonking" lens. Learn how to master MF on your camera (any brand) and you wil be bowled over by what this lens can capture
 | | | | | New Member Registered: November, 2018 Posts: 1
1 user found this helpful
| | Review Date: May 27, 2019 | Recommended | Price: $40.00
| Rating: 9 |
| Pros: | Sharpness, Built, Look, Macro, Focus precision | | Cons: | None | | Sharpness: 10
Aberrations: 9
Bokeh: 9
Handling: 9
Value: 10
Camera Used: Nikon D600
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Just got one in great conditions on Ebay, the only thing i can say is: What a beautiful lens! Very sharp from f4 (but even wide open ain't bad), very well built, super easy to use, great Macro capability, and it looks so cool mounted on camera, which doesnt hurt. Im in love with it!
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