I bought this lens as a lighter weight, travel, weather resistant alternative to my Pentax 16-45mm F4, which according to various tests, should be sharper. Using www.photozone.de test site as a guide, I shot some test frames with the 18-55 at F8, between the 'sweet' focal lengths of 28-35mm. Surprisingly, it matched or surpassed my other lens and is lighter and weather resistant to boot. My 16-45 is sharper at wider apertures in low light conditions but in all but the lowest light conditions, I used the 18-55 at F5.6 -F8 with great results. At 35mm setting, the center sharpness is a close match to a sample of the Pentax 35mm F2.4 prime that I tried and virtually an equal at the sides, if not the corners. For a $150 bucks you can't go wrong. For a kit lens, it's outstanding. I'll be shooting with this lens during some rainstorms on the Big Island Hawaii over the next several weeks. I'll update this review when I return.

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Compact size. Light weight.

Versatility of Zoom. Having a zoom ring.

Having a focus ring allows you to manual focus if desired.

Fully automatic with the Pentax *ist and K100D series bodies.

Use of 52mm filter is a good thing as most of my K lenses use 52mm.

Reversible bayonet style lens hood is really desirable.

Not convenient to use in manual mode. No aperture ring. (but then it is not meant to be used this way I guess)

Build quality is not like the old lenses. Plastic feel.

This lens came with the purchase of my Pentax *ist DS. Initially I did not make much of this lens as I was building up a collection of manual K lens. I was only going to use this in taking snap shots and travel pictures when carrying a bunch of my prime lenses are not practical.

So that's what I did. As time goes by, I notice that the picture quality of this lens is quite okay. I cannot compare it to some of my legendary primes but for most of the work it is very good.

For the price (in my case it came with the camera) it provides a very good value.

Customer Service

Not needed.

Similar Products Used:

Many K manual lenses.