If you would be in Germany I could you send the 24F1.8. Actually I think the 16-50 is heavily design to be corrected. I don't believe that people with this lense will print that large. For them the advantage of bigger sensor like DR and low light are more important. The RX 100 has the same design philosophy and is selling very well. But a Nex 3 is cheaper.
Well if my own experiences are anything to go by, I still remain impressed with the service quality (as well as communications) from Sigma. So just in case there's some voting or positive/negative comments required in this thread, they get a big thumbs up from me.
Would it be worth also asking something like how long does a lens take to arrive from an order being placed to the lens actually being in the photographers hands? Tamron takes the title for me so far, 4 days from placing an order to actually having the lens! The order was not placed online, I prefer to do business through the local retailers (what few actually remain).
I should note that I've had good service from canon and olympus (USA). However I should also note that after I used olympus (the turn around was 4 days for shutter replacement under warranty); they closed the NJ center and moved them to texas (I've not used the texas repair center so no clue if it is as good as the one in NJ).
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4 days (and they covered shipping in both direction) is pretty darn good I think. I also had good out of warranty service via contax but they are defunct so I'm not sure it is worth mentioning them
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On the flip side I've heard horrible horrible things about nikon (usa) (isn't nikon/canon flipped in europe - with nikon giving better service?)
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I've also heard pretty good things about sigma recently - no clue about sony (in usa). I am very curious to hear about Sony and Fuji - as if I go with a second system it is most likely to be one of these - fuji or mabye sony new ff - though I think it will be 3 to 24 months before I seriously consider such.