SR-T 101 with three lenses

[Peter S.]

I just hunted down an SR-T 101 with three lenses I don't got so
far:
- MC W.Rokkor-HG 2.8/35 (7/6 construction rather than the later 5/5 I already got)
- MC Rokkor 1.4/58 - I got the 1.2/58 and various 50mm versions. I am very curious on this lens
- MC Tele Rokkor 3.5/135 (just got the MD 3.5/135 and the faster versions, I need the supplied shade)

And all this for 50$ including shipment! :-)

Best regards
Peter

[k38]

Looks like a great buy!

I have never had a Minolta. In the early 70's I was a Canon FD user. What do you like about Minolta? I have heard that they are easy to focus if you are an eyeglass wearer. Lots of the folks here on the forum like them too. I may have to get one to try it out.

Dwight

[doubs43]

Ron, your SRT-101 sounds like a great camera. I've always held Minolta in high regard even though I've never owned one. Same with the Canon SLR's. Why don't I have one? I already have too many camera/lens mount systems and really don't need to chase yet another. Oh, I've been SORELY tempted but so far have managed to resist. Maybe one day my will to say "No" will crumble but for the moment I just bite mt lip and turn away.

Walker

[Peter S.]

Dwight,

I like the Minolta manual focus gear due to its performance in terms of image quality. I can take
very sharp pictures (I suppose this would be possible with a Canon FD or an older Nikon camera,
too). But the out-of-focus rendition seems to be better, especially for some of the 50mm lenses
and some of the 135mm lenses. All this is possible with only quite a limited investment. Minolta
MF is a dead system, and so prices are pretty low - except for some sought after special lenses.

Ron,
I know, the MC Rokkor-PG 1.2/58 is one of those. Mine did cost me about 200$ - thus this is one
of the expensive MC lenses. I saw it selling for 60$ on a Saturday morning, but the internet
connection was slow on that day, so I missed it :-( . I think by myself, that we see a hausse
at the moment, and that the prices will go down again. There are so many of these babies
around, that I presume its price will go back to around 100$ again.
I like the SR-T 101 - I took my best roll of film with it. 37 pictures consistently good without one
exception. The slow way of photographing it requires (triple checking the exposure, often by
my Minolta Spotmeter) lets me take way better photographs than any autoexposure camera.
For the time being I use Zink-Air batteries in the SR-T, but I consider building a small voltage
regulator to use standard silver oxyd batteries. This would better emulate the flat loading
curve of the mercury battery. I already selected a two pole voltage reference and a ultra low
drop opamp that shoudl do the job. I found no standard voltage regulator that could do it, since
all these ultra low drop voltage regulators don't operate on 1.5V.

Walker,
the SR-T 101 shure was a landmark camera. But from a today's perspective there are similar
cameras available from all the major brands. But it is far from being a perfect camera: it only
got a cloth shutter - unlike its successors the XE and XD cameras. Thus it suffers from a slow
flash synch time. Those have responsive silicon diode based light meters, but lack TTL flash
operation. The X-700 featured TTL flash, but went back to the cloth shutter. None of these had
a spotmeter type of light meter - unlike the XE/XD derivatives that Leica developed.

It would be great to have a Bessaflex with an MD (or at least MC) mount. It would be greater
to have a digital (to complement the analog one, of course) Bessaflex with MD mount.

So to summarize it, for me the great Rokkor glass is reason to be a Minolta addict.
But I saw, that M42 is offering some neat things, too... so I am myself a serious bit tempted.

Best regards
Peter

[nikonbob]

Peter

Good find and a great price to boot. I have had limited experience with Minolta cameras but it has all been good. The only Min camera that I have now is a Highmatic E and the the lens on that is very good. My film scanner is a Min 5400 and I can say nothing but good about it too. There must have been some very good reasons for Leica to have partnered with Minolta at one time. Show us some photos taken with the gear when you can.

Bob

[Randy]

I've got a few SRTs, here's a link to some pics. Randy's SRT Pics

[jody]

Minolta was my first serious camera and the one that started my downfall into the collecting madness. It was a Maxum 5 less expensive than a rebal and twice the camera. Have a few other Minoltas now including a nice 101 to me they are very good cameras at a fraction of the cost. Wide lense choice too.