sen@sbcs.UUCP (Soumitra Sengupta) (04/15/85)
All ye Nikon fans, RESPOND. Being a graduate student, I am perennially short of green bills! So why shouldn't I invest in Series E lenses? The company claims the same lens material, the same process and everything else is same, except for weight and price, for comparable zoom lenses of Series E and Nikkor. Why does a camera equipment seller calls Series E to be a piece of garbage because it is made up of plastic material? Is it? So what? I aint gonna play basketball with the stuff. What difference does a metal lens body make, anyway? I am trying to buy 70-210/f4 Series E. Any advice regarding above will be most welcome. Soumitra (sen) Sengupta ..!allegra!sbcs!sen, sen@sbcs.csnet
ark@alice.UUCP (Andrew Koenig) (04/19/85)
I have heard that it is considerably more expensive to repair a Series E lens if something goes wrong with it than to repair a "standard" Nikkor lens. Treat this as the unconfirmed rumor it is.
darrelj@sdcrdcf.UUCP (Darrel VanBuer) (04/22/85)
Optically, Nikkors and series E are very similar in design and quality. Differences: E series are machine finished, Nikkors are hand fininshed glass (so probably slightly better finished unless the person has a bad day). Mechanical: Nikkors are mostly metal (aluminum and brass) and everything secured with screws, series E uses many fiberglass reinforced plastic moldings, many of the little levers and tabs secured by deforming the plastic rivets to which attached. The mount is still brass, and one half of the focusing tube is metal (so plastic on aluminum vs brass on aluminum). The big difference is in durability (and if you have some really old Nikon cameras, the lack of the prong on E series); the Nikkors will stand daily motor drive use for a decade or more and considerable abuse, the series E lenses are more suited to the kind of use given by a weekend snapshotter. -- Darrel J. Van Buer, PhD System Development Corp. 2500 Colorado Ave Santa Monica, CA 90406 (213)820-4111 x5449 ...{allegra,burdvax,cbosgd,hplabs,ihnp4,orstcs,sdcsvax,ucla-cs,akgua} !sdcrdcf!darrelj VANBUER@USC-ECL.ARPA