What is the best 'all around' lens to carry? Any suggestions? How is the Canon 28-135mm? Would that be a good choice? Thanks.

admittedly, im a noob with all this but i went the digital rebel XT rout, just upgraded to the 20D (soooo worth the money for the size difference..the XT started to feel too petite after two weeks.) I use a 28-135 as my walkaround (at an AWOT'ers feccomendation). Its great for that purpose alone. I use a 50mm 1.8 (cheap, good quality prime lens) that is great for indoors/low light shooting and the kit lens once in awhile (18-55). but I think the 28-135 is a good, usable everyday lens with decent versatility. That being said, my photography looks like **** so ask someone else. Thank you.

so while you'd pick up a nice bit on the narrow end, you'd be missing out on alot on the wide end, which is handy for landscape or cityscape shots.

The kit lens is an 18-55mm, I think. Something along those lines would give you more than adequate coverage on both ends.

For my Elan 7e (which doesn't have the 1.6x conversion issue), I carry around a 24-85mm.

The IS on the 28-135 is handy and it's fairly sharp a couple of stops down.

I think Kirby on the "other" forum is selling one for a good price.

I wouldn't recommend throwing away the 18-28 focal length. So that leaves three options, the kit lens, 17-40L, or a 17-85IS. The kit lens is dirt cheap, while the other two are $650 and $550 (respectively) off the internet. The IS can come in very handy when shooting still subjects in low light. That feature alone would draw me toward the 17-85IS. But the 17-40L is a very nice lens for the money. I've compared this to a 16-35L, and I like my 17-40L much better (and it's half the price to boot). The big drawback is you're trading off a lot of range for this lens...so for a general purpose lens, I'd probably steer you towards the 17-85IS.