[mst]

Idea was not to blame him, but to provoke him into testing this lens.

It's not about testing that lens (did that) but writing the review Of course I understand that doesn't make a lot of difference to you

My personal feeling, though: I'd probably rather go for the Tamron 70-300 VC or Nikon 70-300 VR. But that's not more than a "feeling" so far, which I can't prove with numbers.

It seems to me as if the 55-300 VR is softer at the long end than those FX lenses.

If I were in the market for a more compact zoom lens (the 70-300 lenses are a bit bulky already), I'd rather choose the 55-200 VR instead.

-- Markus