I guess you must be tired of ever the same questions from Nikon newbies - but after reading 684 reviews and comments I have learned a lot, but am still a bit confused...

The thing is: I want to buy a Nikon camera and good lenses for amateur use, but not spend more than $500. I read that the N65 is a good entry-level camera, and that the quality of its pictures will largely depend on the lens you mount on it (of course also of the photographer, but that is another issue).

So I started reading about lenses. The typical 28-80mm zoom lens that is sold as a "combo" with this camera has some very good and some very bad reviews. It seems that it produces reasonably sharp pictures and is light-weight, which makes it a good all-purpose lens. But on the other hand, it seems to be of cheap build.

So I did some further reading and narrowed the search down to the following lenses, for which I have the following (very broad!) conclusions:

1. Nikkor 28-105/3.5-4.5 : Very good optics and quality, but costs around $400. 2. Sigma 28-105/3.8-5.6 UCIII Asph.IF : Good optics, costs around $200. 3. Tamron AF28-105/4-5.6 IF : Good optics and quality (has metal mount), costs around $200. 4. Tokina AF28-105/3.5-4.5 SD : Good optics, very good quality (solid!), costs around $180, but is heavy to carry around, in fact heavier than the camera itself. 5. Sigma 28-70/2.8-4.0 UC : Very good optics, costs around $150, but has rotating front piece (bad for filters).

My questions therefore are:

a) Which one of these zoom lenses would you prefer and for what reasons? b) Would I be better off if I just buy the "combo" 28-80 Nikkor lens together with the wonderful (so I heard) 50mm/1.8 Nikkor prime lens? c) Is it unavoidable to surpass the $500-line in order to get good pictures and enlargements?

Thank you in advance for any suggestions. Just a few words will suffice! Best regards,

-- Claus Krebs - Santiago, Chile (ckrebs@geocities.com), March 28, 2001

Answers

Claus. I'll advice to oreder Nikon Nikkor 28-105/3.5-4.5 AFD from www.bhphotovideo.com for just $269 as imorted products (you don't need Nikon US Warranty any way). Another good choice will be Tokina 28-105/3.5-4.5 AFD for around $160 but it was recently discontinued or try Tokina's newest $350 AFD 24-200/3.5-5.6 which could be very good deal. Mikhail

-- Mikhail Emelianov (emelsm@bignet.net), April 03, 2001.