AlanF said:Brown said:Judging by the year of release, Canon replaced the 400mm f/5.6 with the 400mm f/4 DO didn't they?
The DO 400 f/4 was not a replacement for the 400mm f/5.6: the DO is a much higher price league; and Canon has continued to sell both in parallel.
I know it's not much of a replacement for many of the original buyers of the f/5.6, but the 300mm f/4 was given IS in 1997 while the 400mm f/4 IS DO was introduced in 2001.
The two biggest complaints over the 400mm f/5.6 were its relatively slow aperture and its lack of IS which the 400mm f/4 improved on while keeping a small profile.
Canon retained the f/5.6 in its catalog for the same reason it keeps the 70-200mm f/2.8 non-IS, for those that don't want or need the features of the more expensive IS versions.
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