Hello Boris, I'm writing to share you a little of my experence. I own the Nikkor AF 75-300 4.5-5.6. When I bought this lens, I was looking for some long glasses, and that one was the only I could afford. Later I became a little disappointed by its performance. I found that the pictures were too soft, and not very contrasty. That's only a subjective evaluation, I didn't do any scientific test. The lens is a little heavy, and it's well constructed, altough the push-pull zoom system sometimes is annoying. The weight of the lens generally makes it zoom by itself to the long end if you do not carry it in horizontally. But the main drawback in this lens IMHO was its maximum aperture. Being only f5.6 in the long end makes it only useful in daylight. Any other photos indoors (theather, stadium, events) were hard to take. And in its focal length a speedlight is also unusable most of the times. Now in Nikon line there is also the AF-D 70-300 ED and the AF-D 80-200 2.8 ED. I decided buying the second one based on the reading of my fellows in this excellent digest. I discarded the first one because it is still not fast enougth for me. It was too similar to my old 75-300, only being a little lighter. The 80-200 2.8 is simply very good, sharp and fast. My camera's autofocus seems also faster with this lens. But it is a little heavy and impressive, scaring shy subjects in people's portraits. And it may not be long enougth for your needs... That's why I maintained my old lens. Maybe you have to ask about the impressions of using this lens with a good 1.4x TC as an alternative, but that's something I don't have experience to help you. Any other doubts, just write me Hope it helps nelson kao
