Do any group members have any experience of this lens? I have acquired one but I had not been aware of this lens at all before. Finding out anything about this lens on the web is difficult so any info would be appreciated.

Thanks
Simon

I have been checking out flash voltages at the following website:-

http://www.botzilla.com/photo/strobeVolts.html

I have got 1 or 2 older flashes but would not risk them frying my Pentax *istD internal circuitry so I would like to ask the group what is the last Pentax Model made that would not be affected by these high voltage old-style flashes? ... Would it be the 'P' series of cameras or the 'A' series or something else?

Thanks in advance to the Pentax User(s) with the answers.

Regards
spbatt

Thanks for the advice Kimbo. I will give the lens a good workout and let you know.

As for the lens recently sold on Ebay for £50... that was me ! And I thought it was a bargain too. I half expected that as it only reached £50 that people knew more about the performance of this lens than I did (which was almost nothing) and that it might turn out to be a 'dog' but now I have an inkling that it wont be so bad.

Cheers
Simon

Hi Kimbo

I have just purchased the 24-50mm Pentax-F zoom... you writing 'mediocre at best' certainly hasn't got my hopes up . So my plan is to compare it against a few different Pentax 50mm lenses (K, M and A), sadly i am not lucky enough to have a Pentax 24mm lens to compare it against at the wide end .

Can anyone tell me a good way to test these lenses? I would like to use the *istD but obviously the 24mm end becomes about 36mm and so on, and then (I presume) it won't give an accurate idea of edge sharpness and edge distortion but would at least show contrast and overall picture sharpness differences. I would shoot RAW images.

What is the best subject to shoot to show the differences to their fullest, i.e. a chequerboard pattern on a vertical surface with some colour thrown in? Any advice from the group would be appreciated.

Thanks
Simon

Thanks Kim! Mum's the word!

All the best!

Simon

Hi Kim

You did get lucky, I think it's a great little zoom (even with a loose focusing ring), so I definitely think it would be worth the cost of a relube.

Who are you sending your lenses to nowadays or are you doing most of them yourself (in-house)? If you are doing the relubes yourself what lube are you using (... and where did you buy it from?).

All the best!

Simon

You're right Kimbo, this is an interesting thread.

I have owned both A versions of the 35-70. I was fairly wet behind the ears (still a little dampness there even now) when I owned my first 3.5/4.5 but always felt quietly impressed by the optical quality, not to mention it's compact design, light weight and useful macro facility. All these issues meant that it was almost the perfect lens for taking around the world with me in my backpack and it did a great job. Then on my return I began to hear good things about the f/4 version so I 'traded up'. The f/4 version has impressed me more since I got it and I used it for a month to take a lot of eBay pics. The lens barrel looks virtually unused on it so I was suprised at the looseness of the focusing ring. I accept that there may be a lot of high mileage A35-70 zooms around but these lenses must be especially prone to this problem. Were they quite 'easy' straight out of the box?

I also had the F version and I can't say that I felt like keeping it for long, despite it being optically identical to the A version. It has a slightly cheap feel to it that practically put me off using it at all and the manual focusing ring is not a joy to use. I have also had the M35-70 f2.8-3.5 and thought it was a bit of a cracker, but too heavy and impractical for my purposes.

Any more loose focusing rings out there?

All the best!

Simon

Hello fellow Pentax users,

I may be being dense but I have not come up across this problem before - let me explain...

The "Auto" and "Manual" positions do not work at all on the camera, it reacts as if the mechanical (without battery) shutter was always active i.e.1/125. I've put new batteries in to be sure that the problem was not related to them, the LEDs are working fine as well as the exposure measurement system giving close values compared to my other camera. The system is not following the shutter speed value proposed by the exposure measurement and the shutter closes systematically at the same 1/125 speed. I've placed the lens cap on the 50 mm to see what would happen, and the shutter closed at 1/125 as if the dark didn't exist!

Huge thanks to anyone who has a notion of why this hardly used ME Super is behaving in this odd way.

All the best,
Simon

Thanks George and Kim, I will experiment with the 280T. I do also have a 240Z so I will compare them on my *ist D and let the group know how the results fare for me.

The issue of using older/newer flashes on old and new cameras seems to be as clear as mud - maybe having separate flashes is necessary for now (?).

Regards,
Simon (spbatt)

Hello group,

Does anyone know if a 280T flash will be ok to use with a) an *ist D, b) an LX and c) a Super A (the 3 camera bodies I am most attached to).

I am hoping that I can use it without restictions on new and old Pentax's - if anyone can offer advice then many thanks.

spbatt