Ringflashes cost a lot of money and you can get 2 guns for the price of a good ringflash. You can then use the guns for other things not just macro, but i still might get a ringflash one day.
Your right magpieant i didnt think of tubes without contacts, do they make them without.
As for ring flashes, couldn't say - never used one. I did however read this article in a mag recently (cheers Ven) about a little device that sits over your normal flash and reflects it through a tube like structure over the lens to create a ring flash. I forget the name of it, but they looked quite good, had decent reviews and were canny cheap too!!!
Anth.
I opted for Kenko ones with contacts (help me master camera before going fully manual) from onestop. Looking forward to using them once they arrive.
Is this the one you are talking about? ring flash?