Value for the money

Like most people I do like a bargin and tend to do a bit digging before I make any purchase be it a camera,car whatever so Im interested to here what you consider real value for the money with lenses. I will start the ball rolling with two of my own the Tamron 70/300 and the Sigma 10/20 both in my opinion give good results and both very well priced. Look forward to hearing from you all.
Ian

Sorry guys should have read sigma 17/70 although the 10/20 is a nice lens when you get to grips wwith it.
Ian

Don't know about the Sigma but the tamron 70/300's OK.

I find mine gives better results wide open on the K110, the K200 suffers fringing.

Apart from that a good VFM lens

All of the Tamron SP Adaptall lenses, especially the macros, 35-80mm and 70-210mm f3.5. As long as you are happy to manual focus they are cheap as chips and much more satisfying.
PK/A mount to go with them is another story though.

I'd suggest the following Russian lenses:

Jupiter-9 85/2
Zenitar 16/2.8
Helios-44 50/2

They punch well above their weight and can be picked up for beer money (at least they could before the recent plunge in Sterling).
They are even well made (by fsu standards ) The Zenitar is one of my favourite of all lenses and has a permanent place in my bag.

I've also been impressed by the Tamron 70-300 that I got for £30 from Jessops. It's not a competitor to the DA*300, but it does make a good travel substitute for 1/30th of the price.

R

I thought the Tamron 70-300's suffered from purple fringing on all bodies.

shim

Yes but the sensor can also cause chromatic aberations so there can be a difference.

Fringing isn't a problem on the older 6 meg sensor, infact on the K110 I've had some realy good shots.

But for some reason on the K200, wide open and full zoom presents fringing at the edges. Does this happen on the K10 and K-m which have, I understand, the same 10 meg sensor?:

[IMG]http://i23.photobucket.com/albums/b399/philstaff/sleepycrop.jpg[/IMG]

K10 with Tam 7o/300 at f8 1/1000 at 160mm

[IMG]http://i23.photobucket.com/albums/b399/philstaff/Snoozer.jpg[/IMG]

K 100 D F11 1/350 at 260 mm.

Dont know if you can detected anything from these.

I got plenty of PF with Tamron 70-300 on *ist DS (6 MP), K10D (10 MP) and K20D (14.6 MP). Maybe it was just coincidence that you noticed it more on your K200D. The lens is good VFM anyway despite the PF.

To add to the list: Pentax-A 50mm f1.7, K 135mm f2.5, DA 18-55mm II.

The contrast in the images of the swans isn't high enough to get the PF problem. You'll see it most with the classic example of branches against a brightly lit sky, as well as sometimes other things.

Ok what about lenses at the higher price range are there any that offer good value ?.

aren't we going a bit off topic now

The Tamron 17-50 f/2.8 also looks like a good lens for his value, it's on my list atleast

Nobody said a fifty nifty

The tammy 90mm macro, maybe. I've the pentax 100mm macro but the tamron is cheaper and does preform very well so far I've seen.

the DA* 50-135 is for me also a great lens, I'm not using the 40mm a lot anymore

i found the tamron 70-300mm better on the k20 than on the k200 for ca,