In article <5bh9fm$ch8@vixen.cso.uiuc.edu>, chiang@cs.uiuc.edu says...
>rob1261@aol.com (Rob1261) writes:

>>See Feb 97 Popular Photogaphy for review.
>>They liked it.

>I tried the old 28-200 two years ago and its manual focus ring
>was stiff, AF was noisy and min. focusing distance was too long.

>THis afternoon, I visited my local store to check out the new
>28-200 LD and I was impressed. AF is fast, noise has been reduced,
>and min focusing distance has recuded a lot. Seem to be good
>for my vacation use.
>
>Sam.
>
>PS. Optically, the lens has been tested to be good.

Ummm, I would expect considerable sample variation in this lens,
making a "test" probably not representative of the performance
of the sample one would buy - and I gathered that the sense of
the 'net was that the lens isn't generally too great at the
longer FL's...
Hope This Helps