Need help with a Minolta Maxxum 7000

[rparker762]

Hi all. I just bought a Minolta Maxxum 7000 off ebay and I hope I got a smoking deal. Paid $37.00 including shipping. Anyways, I was looking for a regular SLR and well, I didn't know it was an AF. So, now I have this Minolta and what I've read so far, it's supposed to be a good camera but I did just buy the body. He guarrantees? it to work and it is in really good shape. My question is, can you still get lenses for them and if so are they expensive? Should I turn around and sell it or should I get a lens and keep it?
Any info would be appreciated. Thanks

Ron

[payn817]

The 7000 is/was a good camera. You can still get lenses for it under the brands KM, Sony, Tamron, and Sigma. The Sony being the newest and most expensive of those. YOu can search ebay for minolta lenses and see plenty of options, also KEH.com has a good selection of second hand lenses.

One of the most popular and arguably best lenses is the 70-210 f/4.

[Hoffy]

I have the 7000's successor, the 7000i. Very good cameras in their time (& worth while holding onto, if its a good example)

Like Payn has stated above, lenses are readily available. Also, as suggested, these lenses are the same mount as the current Sony A100, so they should not be disappearing anytime soon. The 70-210 f4 (or commonly known as the "beercan") is an excellent example, but can be pricey (for a 20 year old lense, dont expect much less then $200 on ebay). Dependant on what you want to shoot, there are plenty of other lenses available second hand for around the $100 to $200 region, but be careful with condition

[rparker762]

What would y'all recommend for a general purpose lens to begin with? And, I've read that it has both an auto focus and you can set it to manual as well. Is that true?

[Hoffy]

Yes, thats correct. You can set the camera to be manual focus, but you can only use auto focus lenses.

It all depends on what you want. If you just want a cheap general purpose zoom, maybe look for a minolta 28-80. This will be a cheap lense & will not necessarily be the fastest, but it will get you started. (the average 28-80 were generally sold as a kit lense, so the quality is not quite there as other lenses)

If you want to have a faster lense & you are not too fussed on having a zoom, you cannot go past a minolta 50mm f1.7. These are a dime a dozen, but they still are quite a good lense (much much better then the 28-80). Better still, if you can find a f1.4, excellent, but from my experience it may set you back $200 (not forgetting these lenses may nearly be 20 years old in some cases).

If you need some more info, try this link. This is a full database of Minolta AF compatable lenses

http://www.dyxum.com/lenses/index.asp

[Hoffy]

oh, also, just a word of note. Any of the Digital specific lenses may not necessarily work to well with the 7000, but alternatively any auto focus lenses will work on any Minolta/Sony auto Focus SLR, regardless of it being Fil or being Digital