AF 80-200mm f/2.8D ED (Two Touch) Reputation...

[David H. Hartman]

What is the performance of the AF 80-200mm f/2.8D ED (Two Touch) particularly at 200mm, large apertures and near focus distance? Is there a problem? Is there any one here with personal experience?

Dave Hartman

[richardHaw]

What is the performance of the AF 80-200mm f/2.8D ED (Two Touch) particularly at 200mm, large apertures and near focus distance? Is there a problem? Is there any one here with personal experience?

Dave Hartman

bad focus. i had that problem 10 years ago so i sold it for a 70-200/2.8 VR2
read my 2 80-200/2.8AF articles for some background.

it can be adjusted, just a lot of trouble. i did that on mine, now it focuses perfectly. (not the 2 ring version but principle is the same)

[David H. Hartman]

Thanks for the reply. I'll check out your article.

Dave

[David H. Hartman]

Great article: Richard, you hit the nail on the head. I basically have an amazing 80-155mm f/2.8 zoom with a 200mm soft focus feature. 

Thanks

Dave

[richardHaw]

i may write an article for the 3rd gen but i dont have that lens at the moment, i sold mine 10 years ago

[David H. Hartman]

Do you want to buy mine? 

[richardHaw]

Do you want to buy mine? 

no, looking for a 20/2.8ais but thanks for asking

[Daniel Bliss]

I figured I should say something as I've used the lens a lot but wasn't on the site for a while.

I bought the two-ring in 1998 to replace a 180/2.8, owning it for about nine years. This was frustrating, because while the AF was much faster, obviously the optical performance was a step in the other direction; you could even just make it at out through the viewfinder at 200mm/f2.8 on the N90/F90. It wasn't awful; it just wasn't good. Perhaps you could say "portrait sharp" instead of "landscape sharp".  I learned fairly quickly that while it was fine at all settings for newspaper work, I had to view it for anything critical with slide film as an 80-200 f2.8-4 rather than a straight f2.8. This pretty much pertained with digital as well, although the f2.8 deficiency on the longest 30 or 40mm was not an issue on the 4MP DX D2HS.

The background with Nikon as far as I've been able to tell was this; the 80-200 f2.8 from 1987 was very, very good but also horribly slow focusing and only able to focus down to six feet/1.8m. In 1993 they replaced this with a one-touch D that had a slightly altered optical design, able to focus a foot closer, but with this deterioration wide open at the long end. The two-touch D is this exact design, only with the two touch controls.

If you treat it as a 2.8-4, it should be pretty good even on modern gear; however please note that my only experience using the lens stopped down at this kind of resolution is with very slow-speed slide film, tripod mounted and scanned with an LS-50 at about 20MP, for which it worked well; but I have not used an AF-D 80-200 with current digital gear. The current 70-200 FL however is substantially better, not only compared to the AF-D but also to the VR1 and 2.

[Roland Vink]

The background with Nikon as far as I've been able to tell was this; the 80-200 f2.8 from 1987 was very, very good but also horribly slow focusing and only able to focus down to six feet/1.8m. In 1993 they replaced this with a one-touch D that had a slightly altered optical design, able to focus a foot closer, but with this deterioration wide open at the long end. The two-touch D is this exact design, only with the two touch controls.

To the best of my knowledge, the optics of all three AF 80-200/2.8 ED versions is unchanged, although I can't rule out the possibility that some minor improvements occurred along the way. They all have 16 elements in 11 groups with 3 ED elements. There was nothing in the press releases to suggest the optical designs had changed.

The original AF 80-200 appeared in 1987. It has a one-touch zoom/focus ring with close focus to 1.8m, and manual focus to 1.5m. The filter ring rotates with focusing.

In 1992 it was replaced by the AF 80-200 D with the new D chip. The barrel was also updated. The front element is now recessed within a fixed upper barrel so the filter ring no longer rotates. It retains the one-touch zoom/focus ring with the same close focus limit.

In early 1997 a new version appeared with a redesigned barrel. It now sports separate zoom and focus rings and has a built-in tripod collar, a feature that many had asked for (the previous versions were really too heavy to be supported by the lens mount). AF speed was reported to be faster but the focus limits are still unchanged. This model continued to be produced until relatively recently as a cheaper alternative to the newer AF-S versions and with better backward compatibility with older cameras.

According to this review (http://www.verwoerd.info/nikon/zoom.html), performance at 200m declines at close range so depending on the usage it may need to be treated as a f/2.8-4 lens. Of course individual lenses are likely to perform differently depending on sample variation and how they are used (focal length, focus distance, aperture etc)

[the solitaire]

I owned and used ths lens on D90, D200, D300, D3 and D800. I never used it on film though.

On digital my experience was that I had a pretty good copy.
It was good at f2,8 from 80mm through to about 150mm. It was acceptable up to 185mm. After 185mm it was no longer sharp wide open. It wasn't sharp at f3,2 either. At f4 some sharpness returned, and it was acceptable at 200mm.

Focus accuracy was good at 80-185mm. After that, focus accuracy wasn't that hot either. Possibly because of the lack of sharpness causing interference with the contrast based AF module.

As for resolution, on the 12 Mp D300 sharpness was satisfying. On the D800 the 180mm f2,8 my better half owned was so much better.
Further comparing sharpness, wide open the sharpness on the focal plane was about as good as the 85mm f1,4 AF-D wide open. Stopped down, the 85mm beat the zoom, even at f2 while the zoom was at f4.

All in all the lack of sharpness in the 80-200 f2,8 AF-D two ring prompted me to revert to the 80-200 f4 Ai-S which I liked better in many ways, starting with sharpness wide open (ok, at f4 the bigger zoom was good, but it is also heavier and bigger then the f4 Ai-S lens) but OoF rendering of the Ai-S lens was more pleasing then that of the f2,8 AF-D. Size played a factor, as did weight. And last but not least, MFD on the manual zoom was a lot closer.

[David H. Hartman]

According to this review (http://www.verwoerd.info/nikon/zoom.html), performance at 200m declines at close range so depending on the usage it may need to be treated as a f/2.8-4 lens. Of course individual lenses are likely to perform differently depending on sample variation and how they are used (focal length, focus distance, aperture etc)

From my experience the review is wrong. The AF 80-200/2.8D ED two-touch can deliver extremely sharp results but not with AF due to the adjustment error Richard mentions in his article. I may be repeating myself but I got one extremely sharp image at 200mm and f/2.8 at about 2 to 2.5m. Many others were out of focus and the limits of the AF fine tuning adjustment could not bring it in. So again: excellent AF results at 155mm. so-so at 185mm not usable at 200mm and close distance. Manual focus should work to get accurate focus at close distance and 200mm but that's not what most people buy an AF lens for.

Dave

If one does not know about the adjustment problem the lens has then the conclusion of the author would seem reasonable. I gather that this adjustment problem is common. Since the problem is an adjustment problem it probably varies from lens to lens. I might have a lens at worst end of the range.

[MEPER]

What about the 70-200/2.8 VR (1st version).
I have it but have only used it on DX-sensor. I was surprised by the image quality which I think is very good.
If I had not read all the articles about how bad the lens is I would consider it as a great lens (at least on a DX-camera).
But if used for portraits on FX camera it may be OK if corners are not as good as center and lens may be as cheap as a AF 80-200.....or maybe cheaper.....
I will keep my......maybe I got a "lucky" one where all lenses perfect aligned.

[golunvolo]

I also have the 2 ring version. It misses focus at close range fully open but not at longer distances, at least my copy. I have had many successful images on stage partnering with the d700.
 It is very good in infrared by the way

[David H. Hartman]

What about the 70-200/2.8 VR (1st version).

Rather than try to explain poorly with mistakes, here are a couple of links to Richard's articles...

Repair: AF Zoom-Nikkor 80-200mm f/2.8 ED

Repair: AF Zoom-Nikkor 80-200mm f/2.8D ED

[MEPER]

OK, so you already have the lens and just wanted a 2nd opinion about its "special" performance?
I just assumed that you were looking for a 80-200 because they maybe are prized lower than the newer VR-models.
Therefor my suggestion to look at a 70-200 VR (1. gen) as they are often prized "low" and can make nice images according to my experience.