In article <52dsqg$8hd@newsbf02.news.aol.com>, drmar@aol.com says...

>I wanted to solicit some opinions about the older Nikkor zooms in this
>general range. That would include the f/4.5, the f/4, the Series E f/4,
>and the autofocus constant aperture f/4. I'm particularly interested in
>knowing which is sharpest wide open. If possible, please e-mail me. Thanks
>in advance to those who respond.

The E and constant-aperture AF 70-210's are the same, optically, and are
fine wide-open, as is the 80-200mm f4 (similar performance). The older
80-200mm f4.5's (various versions) are really excellent in the short end
of their range, but a bit below the later lenses at 200mm (still very
good, though). The 80-200mm f2.8's do perform better, though, in most
respects (though they are not compact or light). I am not fond of the
70-210 f4-5.6 AF, and have not tried the 80-200mm f4-5.6. You might
find this interesting:

D. Ruether's "SUBJECTIVE Lens Evaluations (Mostly Nikkors)", version
5a, which includes a listing of all Nikon SLR lenses ever made (with a
subjective evaluation of many of them, a general description of Nikkor
lens performance characteristics by lens-type groups, and comments on
particular lenses when the general descriptions plus the subjective
evaluation numbers are not sufficient to describe performance),
can be found at these sites:

-- Jan-jaap Aue: (nice text format)
http://www.phys.rug.nl/mk/people/aue/nikon/david.html
-- Quang-Tuan Luong: (nice text format)
http://www.cs.berkeley.edu/~qtluong/photography/35mm/nikon-neuman.html
-- Niklas Nikitin: (nice table format)
http://www.cs.hks.se/~nicke/private/photo/lenstest/david.html
-- Bo-Ming Tong: (plain text format)
http://www.cs.arizona.edu/people/bmtong/nikon/c.html
(Appendix C+, number 13 in table of contents)

Hope This Helps