70mm f/2.4 HD review

Just read the review by Gary Wolstenholme and as expected it was a positive review.

The one line that always gets my attention on lens reviews is the price line. In this review "Even with the £570 price tag, this lens represents excellent value for money, given that it is well built and performs well."
By starting the sentence with "Even", it's telling you that it's expensive.

Direct from the main Oz importer and at full RRP including sales tax it costs AU$699 which is GBP413.70

If it "represents excellent value" in the UK what term would you use when outside the UK?

Best regards

It's just another way of saying, "It's not cheap, but it's worth it because it's an outstanding lens" - that could make it excellent value in context with, say, Leica prices. Or Zeiss prices.

So let's say it's as good as or better than a Zeiss lens at a much lower price, then it's certainly excellent value for money.

Out of interest K10D, what is the sales tax in Oz? Really need to compare prices ex tax for them to be valid from the point of view of deciding whether a particular product is a rip-off.

Could do with a website listing every major country and the amount of its taxes so that these comparisons were easier and more meaningful.

There appears to be two types of pricing strategy employed by manufacturing companies worldwide:

1. Cost + a given percentage mark-up

2. Cost + as much as you think you can get away with

Photographic goods seem to fall into No.2

Karlo

I thought it was just within the context of being compared to the old da 70mm

Another lens on the "will never own" list

Will be interesting how this lens performs on the K-3 when it is on sale.

The OOF bokeh does seem better than the SMC model, less fussy. Still not 77mm quality, but a lot better. The curved blades on the HD seem to do their stuff.

For me, it is a lens on the "Want" list. Whether I need it for portraits when I have the mighty DA*50-135mm is another matter. But then again I like to have a small fastish prime for this purpose, and for general use too.

The 50-135 is a great lens and if it looks like rain then it's the one to fit on the camera. Otherwise a selection of compact primes is the perfect way to fill the bag. That's the trouble with lenses, they all have their uses.

I know what you mean, I have a lot of them, maybe too many

Sales tax here is 10%. Of course it's less than 20% VAT but do remember that sales tax and VAT are calculated on the actual selling price.

It looks like Oz is number one and the UK is number two as you say.

Best regards

Is the DA21mm as good (or better) than the Zeiss equivalent?

I thought the DA ltds offered as good/nearly as good build quality, but were not quite in the same league optically.

I didn't make any claims having not tried both, it was a "let's suppose" for the sake of an example for the discussion. If it were true, etc.

Should have tried it, but I haven't. FA 85 and 77 are always the choices over DA70/2.4, so here it is for sale:
https://www.pentaxuser.com/forum/topic/new-hd-pentax-da-70-2-4-45141

May I ask what is the price that you think is sensible and want to give it a try? I surely meant this new HD one. £413 + vat and import tax (£500) is still cheaper than uk retail price (£576)

£413 is good value for money, but £576 is just a joke, in my opinion.