8 vs 5 contacts

[Dusty]

I just bought a used Tammy 80 - 210, and it has only 5 contacts. It seems to work just fine in all modes.

That begs the question - what are the other 3 contacts for? The answer aya be buried here, but I didn't want to page thru 9 pages of Lens forum subjects on the chance I'd find it.

Thanks,
Dusty

[bfitzgerald]

5 contacts are non "D" type lenses. Thus they have no distance information. This means ADI flash won't work for these lenses (but TTL obviously does), not a huge issue IMO.

Other areas, for example on my film 7, with D lenses you get a rather nice DOF display readout on the back panel..which you don't with non D lenses. My 60 won't do DMF with non D lenses, though it does on other DMF capable bodies.

[Vidgamer]

I just bought a used Tammy 80 - 210, and it has only 5 contacts. It seems to work just fine in all modes.

That begs the question - what are the other 3 contacts for? The answer aya be buried here, but I didn't want to page thru 9 pages of Lens forum subjects on the chance I'd find it.
...

I saw a recent thread with nearly the same title on another web board!

Anyway, it doesn't make a big difference. The main thing that I've read is that it is for ADI (?), providing distance information for flash. This doesn't work if you're bouncing your flash, so sometimes this mode is wasted on me anyways.

Rumor has it that the ADI distance info. might be used for assisting SSS (stabilization), although, IMO, it isn't big enough to be noticeable. If forced to choose between the two, I'd get 8-pin just to be sure, but I have some old 5-pin lenses that work fine.

Ok, I see that Barry beat me to the reply, but I typed it, so I might as well send it.

[Dr. Harout]

Even some newer lenses, i.e. Sony lenses (re-badged, of course ) have 5 pins, such as the 28/2.8