[Leica] 75 'cron & Leica's inventory revaluation

[summicron at bellsouth.net (Frank F. Farmer)]

Greetings all,

I just returned from a conference in Chicago (and resubscribed to the LUG) 
and on my few chances to get out of the hotel I wandered down to Central 
Camera on South Wabash.  Central is a great old camera shop and I learned 
two things while there:

1)  After never really putting much value in the 75mm focal length, I want a 
new 75 'cron.  This was a solid lens but it balanced very well on the camera 
and did not block the frame lines.  It didn't suffer from the loose apeture 
ring that we've been hearing about.  It focuses faster and closer than the 
'lux.  I think the fact that the 'lux only focused to 1 meter was the 
limiting factor for me.  Unfortunately, I didn't get to burn any film with 
it as I was there at closing time and didn't get to play as much as I'd like.

2)  The other thing that I learned was that Leica, in it effort to increase 
the value of its existing inventory, is planning another price increase for 
July 1, 2005.  New bodies will be over $3,200.00.  Just FYI.  Is this news?  
Probably not considering how common they've become.  My brand spanking new 
M6TTL was only $1,895.00 from B&H barely four years ago.

Any thoughts on the issues?  Has anyone done much shooting with the new 75 
'cron?  There is a short article about it in the Leica news magazine I just 
received but it is not the same as a real world review.