Minolta MD lenses

srichards

srichards

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Just had a bit of a mad adaptor buying frenzy and got a minolta AF to MD converter to use minolta MD lenses on my sony.

Which minolta MDs are worth getting?? Thinking along the lines of fastish primes that go for under £50 that I can practice manual focussing with. Seen vivitar 28mm f2.5s and Solgor f2.8s that are cheap. Are they much cop? A stronger macro would be quite good as my sigma is only 1 to 1 so if I can get a 2 to 1 or more that would be quite good.

Also had a mad moment and got a Nikon converter so that I can use any Nikon AI lens with the sony. Any recommendations on those? Don't know whether it will retain AF and such like. I hope so. If it does I'd be wondering about long lenses potentially as it opens up a world of options... and with in body IS I don't have to worry about whether the nikon thing has VR or not.
 
Huh! Info for MF lenses for a digital camera in a film section :(....we need em for ourselves.
 
I've got a dynax 7 35mm I could use them with too so ner!!
 
Retaining AF? Doubt it, since the AI lenses aren't autofocus in the first place - if that's what you meant.

Generic primes are always 28mm f/2.8s, 50mm f/1.4/1.8/2 and 135mm f/2.8/3.5 - I'm not sure how many of these fall into your budget (I don't know the market for Minolta unfortunately) but I imagine one of the 50mm f/1.8 (it might be f/1.7 for MD) should fit within that.
 
I assumed from the compatibility table on Mr Rockwell's site that newer lenses should work with older bodies to some degree so that newer style lenses should sort of work (if limited in features) with an AI adapter as old AI lenses still work on all modern Nikon dslrs. I may be wrong. AF I can live without but would have been a bonus.

28mm prime is the favourite to get at the moment.
 
Vivitar 28mm f2.8 close focus by Komine is a nice little lens, MD Rokkor 45mm F2 is a fantastic lens, as I would imagine are th 50mm Rokkors.
 
Re. Nikon lenses, any lens you can probably get your hands (including a number of pre-AI lenses) will fit your adapter. No autofocus, I am unaware of any adaptor that can give autofocus. Also, the most modern Nikon lenses do not have manual aperture rings and as such you will not have aperture control. Not that any modern Nikon lens falls in your apparant price range.

Re. MD lenses, in my experience, anything Minolta made (i.e. Rokkor) is going to be good. For the prices they can be had at, I would always spring for Rokkor first over third party MD. Top quality lenses, I personally have the 50mm F1.7 and 28mm F2.8 and they are sweet as.
 
^ adding to that, the lenses with no aperture rings are 'G' lenses. However, even though most AF and AF-D lenses do have aperture rings, their focus rings in general aren't really designed for manual focusing and if you are only buying the glass to use for manual focus anyway, it's probably best to look at the AI/AI-S versions.
 
After a tip off from this very forum I plumped for a Minolta 28mm. It is beautiful. I was so desperate for it so I paid over the odds in a bidding war and ended up paying £37 but it was well worth it.
 
Will see what I drop on. Not going to go looking just yet as I've spent too much on bits n bobs already!
 
As has been said, the Minolta Rokkors are top notch manual focus lenses. I have a 28mm F2.8 Rokkor-x, a 50mm F1.4 pf, 45mmF2 and some Vivitar and Kiron zooms. Can't really go wrong with the Rokkors really.
 
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