The only basis for any of these lens performance judgements are Gary
Reese's Zuiko lens tests. A 50/1.4 lens identified only as having a
serial number > 1,100,1000 tested better than any other 50/1.4. But a
multicoated lens with serial number > 1,000,000 tested almost as good
and another with serial number < 1,000,000 tested not much below that.
But if you were to shoot any of these lenses at f/5.6 or f/8 you'd never
be able to tell the difference between them.
An older, single coated lens not identified by serial number was at the
bottom performance wise. However, the test on that lens was performed
on an OM-1 with only mirror lockup to prevent vibrations. It was much
later on in his testing process that Gary realized that the biggest
vibration factor was not mirror slap but the kick from the diaphragm
stop down lever. It took an OM-2000 with self-timer aperture prefire 2
seconds ahead of shutter activation to show how badly vibration was
affecting the test results. So, many of the test results are somewhat
confounded by not being carried out in the same way and it *does* make a
difference.
In the end, unless you're shooting from a tripod and using the OM-2000
with self-timer and aperture pre-fire you can't duplicate Gary's mimimal
vibration results and the differences between all those high serial
number multi-coated lenses probably totally evaporates. The older
single coated version probably isn't as sharp as the newer ones but had
it been tested in the same way it would likely show much better than it
does. And, as AG will attest, those old silvernoses have
characteristics all their own having nothing to do with sharpness.
Chuck Norcutt
usher99@xxxxxxx wrote:
> The transition from ZUIKO MC AUTO-S to ZUIKO AUTO-S appears to have
>
> occured between 1,013,xxx and 1,130,xxx
>
> -jeff So the Zuiko Auto-S designation correlates with the slightly
> sharper version or is that just a function of the serial number?
>
> Mike
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