Not the biggest fan of this review because of three issues:
1. There is no need to treat this lens as a 600 f8 and compare it to the 200-600 at f6.3 . Slightly below 600, the 400-800 will be 7.1 and actually show the same FOV as the 200-600. (see ?t=680)
On this point I was certainly encouraged to know I'd only lose 1/3 of a stop of slight over the 2-6 at around 590mm, but then I wondered just how easy it would be to ensure I was indeed only at 590mm, making this a bit of a moot point. In the field I zoom in and out as needed without really noting the actual focal length (because who has time to stop and look at the lens barrel?) and I'd hazard a guess that, as with my 2-6, I'd spend most of the time at or near the longest end of the range with the 400-800.
So ultimately I'm still on the fence about the 400-800 because of the relatively slow speed and my already-too-high ISO in many situations with my 2-6. I'm definitely waiting for people to have the lens in hand to hear if it's worth the light sacrifice because, as you say, reviews from the myriad Sony Ambassadors do tend to be a bit gushing at times.
It seems like the 200-600 is around 580mm at 600mm, so this is an objective comparison: 580 f6.3 vs 580 f7.1. That's it.
From your explanation, it sounds like you need the 400-800, because you said yourself you would be near 800 most of the time, which the 2-6 cannot do, which means the 2-6 is currently limiting you hard, and even when it does reach 800mm with the 1.4x, you get f9, which is worse than f8, so you get more noise and its IQ suffers quite a bit with the TC.
You cannot even say "but it's 840mm!" because it's really not, it's more like 812mm with the TC 1.4x.
Mar 08, 2025 at 05:15 PM
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