55-300

Spot on guys, looks like everyone agrees that there is no difference in image quality between the DA and the DAL. it is good to hear that most say there is a marked improvment in quality between the Pentax and the third party lenses PJ has all but convinced me that it is worth the extra money to get what you all say is a very good lens whether it be the DA or the DAL.

Thanks,
Ben

Thanks DpM but i think i will go for the DA, most of the pictures i will be using it for are going to be of ships and fishing boats so the quick shift could prove useful in lively sea conditions.

Cheers,
Ben

Both 55-300mm lenses have ED elements. The DA has two.
I don't know if the DAL has one or two? Pentax rarely
give out precise glass details.

The 18-55mm is reported to be available in 4 variations
See
http://ricehigh.blogspot.com/2013/08/different-optical-constructions-of-four.htm...

OR

http://forum.xitek.com/thread-866434-6-1-1.html


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Algi, there are indeed four 18-55mm lenses, but that's got nothing to do with the 55-300mm.

The original 18-55mm was replaced by the MkII so we could take advantage of the increased resolution of the K20D. The WR version arose so we could have a WR lens for obvious reasons. The DA-L version is a lower cost version with no QuickShift, no metal mount and no lens hood.

PS if you continue to read the responses to the RiceHigh information, it quickly becomes apparent that his info is somewhat questionable.

I add this image here purely because it was taken with a K30 which the OP wants to use a 55-300 with, and for this shot I used the 55-300 DAL. So it is a good point of reference:




It's a great lens, and can't recommend it enough.

I completely agree with everything people have said. I have the DA version, and is a stunning lens on my K-5 Classic. Shot many go-karting pictures recently and there was no issue with focussing. One real benefit of the DA/Quick Shift focus is that you can 'pre-focus' manually to the right range before letting the AF take over. I run a two-zoom kit along with the 16-45 for hiking and walk-around (plus the SMC-A 50/1.7 when I'm in the mood), and this covers all situations that I've come across so far.

I wonder if you could expand on this saying why the 55-300 is better? I struggle with this choice on a weekly basis as I have owned the Sigma 70-300 APO version with film and it was naff on digital, so tried the 55-300 and the tamron 70-300 LD Di at srs and went for the tamron (2nd hand). Then the tamron broke on me so I went thru' the dilemma again and this time srs was selling the tamron for £109 with a 5 year warranty and the pentax 55-300 for £299 with a 2 year warranty.... Again I went for the tamron, and it is a better one than previous, with very little purple fringing and AF is spot on and very quick with the K-30. The reason I've been put off the pentax is that almost every thread I've ever read about it on other sites mention slow af and problems with hunting (which I can say I almost never experience with the tamron). Also the min focus is not very good on the pentax but the tamron goes to 1:2 (very important to me).
As jessops have it at £239 I'm going thru' my usual dilemma (and perhaps srs would price match......). Even though I have a Pentax FA*300 4.5 I still use the tamron a lot as my wildlife walkround lens and I would like to make sure that I'm getting the best out of that focal length and if need be would add the pentax to my collection. Bird/wildlife and macro/closeup are the 2 manin things I use this lens for.
Thanks

I'm a fan of the Tamron, that 1:2 has proved to be very useful. I'm without a zoom right now and am inclining towards the Tamron again if ever.

Never found myself using quick shift on a zoom, more on servo instead.

To answer your questions Walt, I found the Sigma fine up until approximately 200mm and then it became soft. The Tamron was sharper and was much quieter/faster on the AF than the Sigma but I had awful purple fringing problems using it with my GX-10, whether that was down to sample variation in the lens or the anti-alias filter on the GX-10's CCD I'm not sure. I've just found that the DA55-300 delivers better IQ than either of the others for the kind of shots I do when sailing in and out of ports like Hull, IJmuiden, Rotterdam Eurpoort and Zeebrugge. I will concede that the 1:2 Macro facility on the Tamron is a feature that is useful for macro/close up photography.

I've overcome the hunting issue on the DA55-300 by using the method microlight2010 has mentioned on both my classic K-5 and GX-10 without any issues.

people talking about the pentax 55-300 hunting are probably commenting on the DAL version of this lens and I can confirm that, yes, it hunts something awful but then I'm using it for airshows, trying to focus on stuff against a sky background so if I'm not bob on with my focusing, it hunts due to lack of contrast on the sky.

in normal conditions, I found mine doesn't hunt at all. a lot of it has to do with knowing the quirks of the hardware I think.

Thanks Paul very helpful, I know from personal experience that reflections from water will show up purple fringing pretty fast if it exists in the lens, so I suspect your sailing use would probably be one of the more extreme tests for the tamron. FYI mine was used on a gx-10 for years before my upgrade to the K30.

I don't find my DAL 55-300 to be awful regarding focus hunting. It's not fantastic, but I happily live with it.

Thanks, a lot of my use is Birds in flight so your comments are very appropriate.

It hunts a lot more on older bodies. On the K-5II variants the problem has almost completely gone away and I would imagine it performs well on the K30 too. Any hunting is more than compensated for by image quality, which for a lens of this price is quite incredible.

Regards
David