Good range Cheap Feels solid Images when stopped down

Autofocus decent Noisy autofocus VERY soft at f/3.5 Small lens hood

This is a decent beginner lens. There's nothing it does exceptionally bad, nothing that it does really well. The autofocus is nothing more than decent, although it's rather noisy. The front element rotated, but it does't get in the way of your hand. Image quality is decent, but sharpness is very very poor at 28mm f/3.5. The aperture is distributed as follows: f/3.5 from 28-30mm f/4 from 30-37mm /4.5 from 31-48mm f/5.6 from 49-100mm

Customer Service

None needed

Similar Products Used:

None

Good sharpness and contrast in bright conditions Very nice color rendition under the same conditions Bokeh is hit and miss

Poor sharpness and contrast when subject is beyond 20 feet away Bokeh is hit and miss

This lens is of reasonable quality in sharpness and contrast as long as you are within 20 feet of the subject. I have gotten some remarkably sharp and contrasty images in close quarters and some awful ones where the color balance was off from one side of the picture to the other. It can be a decent walk-about lens but you have to be able to get in close with very good light to take full advange of its good qualities. I am waiting to receive a Minolta 28-135mm f/4-4.5 that will be its replacement.

Customer Service

Haven't used it yet

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Minolta 100mm f/2.8 macro - excellent lens Minolta 28-80mm f/3.5-5.6 - awful lens Minolta 50mm f/1.7 - really nice lens

- decent optics - price

- cheap plastic feel - manual focus ring very small and difficult to use

A good all around lens for the price, I guess, but certainly not a great lens. It is rather cheap feeling and I doubt it is going to last very long with heavy wear and tear. Optically, it is a decent lens. And for the price (under $100 new) you probably couldn't get a better lens. There are some available on E-bay as "refurbished" units. They are KM warranteed and in the box. I bought one and it was as good as a new lens, except I paid US$27 + shipping. A real steal. If you can get this lens for this cheap, go for it. Otherwise there are other worthy lenses in this focal length range worth considering. I am probably going to get rid of it in favor of the faster and better built KM 28-75 f/2.8 D lens.

Customer Service

haven't needed it.

Similar Products Used:

Sigma 28-80 Macro II - similar inexpensive lens

* 28-100 is good coverage for general walkabout shooting. * Compact and lightweight. * Shares the 55mm filter size with my longer zooms, so I don't have to buy multiples of specialty filters.

Only comes in the Silver/Black combination - which is OK by me, but is a problem for some people.

Bought this one as a refurb, to use as the base 'walking around lens' for a Maxxum 7. It has performed beautifully for that purpose. Some folks deride this one for being a 'cheap kit lens'. And sure, it is. But unlike many in that category, this one makes great pictures.

Customer Service

Have never needed it with Minolta.

Similar Products Used:

Several Minolta lenses - including two direct cousins of this one, the 35-80 f/4-5.6 (as base lens on a Maxxum HTsi Plus), and the 75-300 D.