>In article <36ba6c87.15201805@newsstand.cit.cornell.edu>,
> d_ruether@hotmail.com wrote:

>> I tried one 75-300 Nikkor, and three 70-300 Nikkors.
>> Most people seem to like, or prefer, the new lens.
>> I didn't. I expect Nikkor teles and tele zooms to
>> perform well to the corners wide open. The 70-300
>> (in common with another relatively recent zoom,
>> the 70-210 f4-5.6) did not meet that standard...
>> (I tried three, since I wanted to own this new
>> lens, but I prefer the 75-300 for its better corner
>> performance wide open - at least for the near-infinity
>> targets I check lenses with...)

On Mon, 01 Feb 1999 21:20:09 GMT, stanshooter@yahoo.com wrote:

>David,
>Can we imply from your message that you found center sharpness up to
>traditional Nikkor standards at infinity?

This is a reasonable assumption, but, gosh, I dunno
if it is...! ;-) Actually, in lens checking the first
time around I do a simple and quick check for good
alignment and good wide-aperture edge/corner performance
(at the widest stop at which I would expect/demand good
performance, which would be around f5.6 for lenses
18-28mm, f2.8 for lenses 35-50mm, and wide-open for
longer lenses). Lenses that fail these checks don't
get checked further, unless I have spare film at the
time of doing the first check. It is reasonable to
assume, though, that any Nikkor will perform well
in the center wide open, since the VAST majority of
Nikkors do. Lenses that I want to keep (and which
pass the first quick check) get a more thorough
center-to-corner check-out later...
For me, a lens that is not reasonably sharp to
the corners at a given stop cannot be considered sharp
at that stop - and, for me, I want to be able to use
long lenses wide-open for any purpose. The three
70-300mm Nikkors I tried did not perform well enough
for me... (And, BTW, for those who have still not run
across it, there is a Nikkor subjective evaluation
list on my web page, under "I babble" [I will try to
update it soon to include the 70-300, and a few
adjustments in some other lens' ratings...])