Ebay prices.

This afternoon, for the third time in as many months, I have been outbid for a Pentax 50mm f1.7 F lens.
I can't believe the price these lenses go for! You can buy a BRAND NEW Nikon 50mm f1.8 AF lens for around £80. A Brand new Canon 50mm f1.8 AF lens for around £70. I know it's a good lens but it cant be that much better than the rival manufacturers versions! The F series lenses are getting on for twenty years old, but still sell on ebay for close to a hundred quid; No doubt due to the fact that they are not made any more. This seems even more insane when you think that you can buy the 50 f1.4 FA, which is still made, for around £150. The first one I bid on had a broken filter thread, yet some Twit wanted it enough to pay £88 for it. MAD!
Pentax are missing a trick here - If people are paying silly money for second hand examples, They should start making them again. The demand is obviously there.

If/when Pentax bring out a FF body any time soon (next 18 months or so) I think we will see a revival of the FA series of lenses, probably called D-FA as per the Macro lenses.

With regard to the prices on ebay, the Pentax 50mm lenses are probably superior to the other makes you mention so to my mind, in mint condition they could be worth it.

If a new 50mm sells for £160.00, then £100 for a used one in excellent condition is OK.

It will be much better made than Copiercam lenses selling for £80.00. And optically superior. And able to work with better bodies.

A pretty good deal all round, in fact.

G

I'm sure George is right. I don't know anything about non-Pentax cameras or lenses.

But there is a madness about some eBay buyers.

Recently, I've seen my own (originally John Riley's) 75-300 go for more than the new price at the time from SRS.

And I watched an imported scanner (with only a US warranty) go for more than the Microglobe new price for the same thing.

I can only conclude that there are plenty of daft buyers out there that can't be bothered to do even a little research into what they're buying.

On rare occasions I've seen 50 F1.7s sell for more than Chris is selling brand new F1.4s.

People assume that Ebay=Cheap, and it only takes two idiots to start a bidding war which ends higher than the new price.


I was looking for a clapped out old laptop for a project a couple of months ago. All I wanted was a Pentium or better with a working screen, but every vaguely working lappy on ebay goes for £100+, and several of the broken ones got near to £100.

I rarely visit ebay anymore, you have to spend hours wading through overpriced junk and BIN listings with huge postage from HK to find the few remaining good deals. It isn't worth it.

Rather than look at lenses try looking through the cameras for sale.
I found this which included the lens for a reasonable price.

i missed a trick here. why the 1.7 instead of the 1.4? i am sure i have read on these forums that both are more or less the same and those that did not agree thought the 1.4 was slightly better

The f1.7 lens has a flatter field and is more suitable for close up work, especially when combined with other close-up devices.

The f1.4 is pretty much the same stopped down but has slightly different image characteristics and is more suited to reportage and other low light or available light situations.

I would happily use either, and indeed I do happily use either.

Oooh! You are a lucky sockpuppet!

Bugger Ebay!... I'm going to buy a new f1.4 FA

Thank you, Gentlemen.

As well as having a flatter field, the 1.7 is smaller and lighter than the 1.4.

I don't think there is anything silly about paying £100 for for a second-hand F or FA 1.7 if it is likely to be in excellent optical condition.

They are not as common as the manual-focus versions, so naturally people pay a premium for the convenience of auto-focus. Yet still they save fifty quid compared to the FA 1.4, and have a lens that is better in some ways, too.

Another example of ebay madness is currently under way. An SFX with 50mm, 28mm F lenses and a crappy zoom is now at £206. with 2 days to go!

I was watching that for a while