Here we go!

Current Ebay ad for DA 55-300mm
"This lens is only for sale as I dropped loads of hints to my family that I desperately wanted one for my birthday and surprisingly got two!"

Yeah, right, the half price Amazon family that'll be then

That's right, they were both purchased off amazon in the half price sale. One by me as a birthday treat to myself and one by my wife who had taken notice of the virtual Post-it note with the name of the lens typed in big bold capital letters and had been looking for one for my birthday/christmas (16/12). Why send one back when I can maybe make a small profit to help with Christmas costs?

Regards

Lee

Shame on you guys, that may be a genuine statement.

Sorry, I just realised the measures of Scotch poured by my wife have left me unable to evaluate things correctly

Apologies. Although it was only meant to be light hearted. I don't blame you at all. I am in a similar position. I got one as well. I wanted to see how much better it was than than my DAL 55-300mm. Got to do a few tests yet but one will have to go. Either way someone else will get a bargain.

Optically it's exactly the same. However, the DA version has metal mount, Quick Shift and a dedicated lens hood included.

Careful .. that's a dirty word to some people round here.

I've mentioned this before, but it's worth restating.

Having QuickShift makes an enormous difference to the usability of the lens. It's long focus throw makes AF slow *if* the camera ends up having to drive the lens from one end to the other.

However, with QS it's possible to move it manually to close to where you need it, in which case AF is perfectly quick enough. Without this it would be a lot less useful for photographing moving targets.

The other thing that makes it more useful with moving targets (I've used it at airshows a fair bit), is to let the camera pick the AF point. That way, if you're panning, you're less likely to lose the subject and have the lens hunt suddenly to one end or the other. With Auto-AF point selection, you have a much bigger area of the VF within which to keep the target.

Chris,

Is Auto-AF point selection just on the K5 or also on the older bodies :

Hyram,

all bodies that I'm aware off.

The K-5 (not sure about the K-r) has the ability to use just the 5 centre AF points as well as all of them which is very handy.

Soooooooo ....., buy your wife a camera for the second lens

K10D certainly can, so I imagine the K20D can too. The switch is on the back of the camera.

Not sure about the -x/-r.

Yeah think you should have done some 'light reading' before purchase, guess the middle man Ebay will be happy either way

No chance, if i push my luck too far both lens will be on ebay!

Thanks Chris.

I should have known that but always manually set it, normally on centre point.