No.

G

I think Pete meant "a fair amount" in the sense of "quite a lot".

G

I have a friend who has an answer to that. Whenever I say: "I can't afford to do this, that, or the other" he replies: "You can't afford NOT to do it".

Great advice. It's cost me thousands over the years, but do I regret it? Rien!

G

I have some sympathy for your view, but take account of this:

1 The lens is a joint effort between Tokina and Pentax. The Tokina version has been available for some time and is well regarded.
2 Pictures have been published, by Ned Bunnell amongst others, which suggest that optically the lens is very good indeed.
3 The lens has an aperture of 1:2.8 - much faster than any other current Pentax zoom.
4 The lens is weather-sealed.
5 The lens has super-fast focussing.

The final three points take the lens into another realm. It really isn't comparable with the 16-45mm 1:4, and the price differential is fully understandable given the differences between the two.

Of course, you may say that these things aren't important to you, or that you can't afford the price. Well, fair enough, but if they are of benefit, and if you can afford it, then I personally think that we already know enough about the lens to shell out the money.

After all, it's a Pentax "star" lens, and no "star" lens has ever been bad. Just look at the prices they fetch on Ebay.

G

Those who want the lens were given the opportunity to pre-order. Those who did are happy. Those who didn't can't really blame Pentax for producing something that everybody wants.

Of course, they could put the price up.

G

And the final, and even more important, piece of good news, is that today SRS were phoning people saying that they had lenses available for those who had pre-ordered.

G

It might actually be a very good lens. I remember hearing that the Ricoh 50mm was sharper than almost anything else, including Pentax.

G

Or leave the lens in the shop.

Actually, there's more choices:

Use it for macro on extension tubes, or
Use a t/c to make it into a nice 270mm. It's fast enough.

And if you use one of those cheap 1.7 t/cs you'll have autofocus, too.

G

Ricoh used the original Pentax K mount. When they decided to go automatic they did so by incorporating a little pin in the base of the lens, similar to that used on late screw-mount Takumars.

This pin tends to get stuck in the hole on Pentax AF cameras where the AF actuator is sited.

So, you have these choices:

go for an early Ricoh, sans pin, or
use it on an MF Pentax body, sans hole, or
remove the pin, or
take a chance.

G

Attn: All new members

It's very helpful to know what country a person is based in. At the top of the page is a menu which includes the word "Profile".

Click on this and you can tell us where you hail from, and then we can tailor our suggestions appropriately.

G