> I think just about all of these zooms become soft to varying > degrees at 300 mm. Unless you need 300, the 80-200 f4.7-5.6 is a > surprisingly sharp little lens.
Not all 100-300's are soft at the long end. I do not have any experience with the autofocus Tokina AT-X 100-300/4 at all, but the manual focus AT-X 100-300/4 is as sharp at 300mm as it is at 100mm. See: http://www.cetussoft.com/pentax/x1003004/x1003004.htm Fred
