Canon Eos 30 (7e) - best zoom lens (-300/-400)

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I' m a recent owner of a Canon Eos 30 camera. I' d like to buy a zoom lens like 75-300, 100-300, 80-400. I have a Sigma 28-105/2.8-4.0 lens and I'm particularly interested in Tokina 80-400. Is it a good buy? Should I look for Sigma 135-400 or 75-300 APO MACRO? What choices do I have? (Perhaps Canon 75-300...) Thank you.

-- Stelios Veronis (steliosveronis@hotmail.com), September 25, 2001

Answers

Best to stick with Canon. I'd recommend either the 75-300 or 100-300 USMs, or if you're spending a little more, the 75-300 IS. If you can afford it (but I'm guessing you can't from your list of suggested lenses) the Canon 100-400 L IS is the one to go for.

I had a Sigma 70-300 APO macro, which was reasonable optically, but the design was so poor, focus so slow and noisy that I decided to move on to the Canon 70-200 F4L USM (I have another 300mm lens). I have heard that the Tokina is not a great lens, and has no tripod mount. It was one of the first X-400 lenses. I suspect that the Sigma 135-400 would be better, but neither are by any means brilliant. Stick with Canon.

-- Isaac Sibson (Isibson@hotmail.com), September 25, 2001.


The best economy zoom glass available is the EF 100-300L f5.6. B&H has it in the low 300's. The big drawback is that it has a relatively noisy, slow AF because it is not USM; also, it does not have full time manual focus enabling you to fine-tune focus while in AF mode. (You can find these on ebay, but they typically go for close to 300, and note that if you buy new you get the hood included.)

The 100-300 USM (non-L) does have USM and FTM but does not have L glass.

For the money I would go for the L glass, and I, too, would recommend sticking with Canon lenses. What it comes down to is a trade-off balancing economy, image quality, and lens features.

-- Rod (rod.nygaard@boeing.com), September 25, 2001.


Keeping it below 1k, you could also keep an eye out for a used 300L f4 non-IS version. I've seen it go on Ebay for under $700.

-- Rod (rod.nygaard@boeing.com), September 26, 2001.

I just purchased an Elan 7E as well.

After weeks of debate between the 100-300 5.6L, 100-300 USM, and 75- 300 variants, I decided to go with the 70-200 4L. Why?

1) I'm a stickler for image quality, thus L optics. 2) I like USM, thus no 5.6L 3) I wanted to spend under 1k, thus no 100-400 USM.

I gave up the 300, reasoning I could buy a 1.4x and do just as well as the 100-300 5.6L later--with USM.

-- Jeff Hall (halljs@agere.com), October 07, 2001.


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