Leica M same as Minolta M?

[Cato]

I belive there's a big chance there won't be any replies to this. But I'm asking, if anyone has any knowledge or can help figure this out, I'd truly appretiate it.

My dad handed me down some Leica equipment the other day, cameras, lenses, filters, etc. I've been storing it for awhile, till I read a very short note in a photography mag that I subscribe to, mentioning the Epson R-D1. This digital camera continue to use this Leica equipment, very interesting! I'm not going to buy this camera just to use that equipment, but it made me search the web some more.

I am a Minolta user and have been for some time, well, Sony now Anyway, I found that Minolta and Leica worked together on making one of the cameras I'm storing, Leica CL, and it take these lenses. Apparently, it use the Leica M mount, and Minolta made some Rokkor lenses for this called M-Rokkor. Is this the same M mount as Minolta used on the Minolta manual focus cameras, which take the lenses called MC and MD Rokkor? If so, there is a mount adaptor which make it possible to use the M mount lenses on the A mount which the autofocus lenses use and that Sony will continue to use. I know it makes it possible to use the MC and MD lenses on the A-mount, but can it take the M-Rokkor lenses made for Leica CL, and can it take the other Leica lenses for the Leica M mount? If yes, then I'll get the adaptor, although it's a x2, and play with these lenses on my KM A-mount camera Although, I don't think it's the same mount, just the same name basically But I don't know for sure and I can't find any information that answer this on the net. Anyone know?

Cato

[cyclohexane]

This a good place to start checking things out:

http://www.cameraquest.com/leicacl.htm

http://www.cameraquest.com/cle.htm

[dougjgreen]

FYI, Minolta made exactly 2 cameras in the M-mount, which were rangefinders, not SLRs. These were the Minolta CL, also known as the Leitz-Minolta CL, and the more advanced, electronic, Minolta CLE. These were excellent cameras, and I still own and occassionally use a Minolta CLE. But this was an entirely different lensmount from any other Minolta Cameras ever made. In fact, it is the same lensmount as Leica M-series rangefinders used, and the lenses work on Leicas, and most of Leica's M-mount lenses also worked on those Minoltas.

There are only 3 Minolta M-mount lenses, a 90mm f4.0 short telephoto, a 40mm f2.0 normal lens, and a 28mm f2.8 wide angle. They are optically superb, and quite costly for old used manual focus lenses, because they are viewed as Leica equivalents. The 28mm had a problem, because the coating on most of them went bad, and white spots formed on the inner glass of most of them. The 40mm f2, in particular, is widely praised, and many Leica users think it's as good as most Leica lenses, and it's amazingly small and light..

MD and MC Rokkor lenses are completely different from Minolta M lenses. - The MC, and the later, enhanced MD mount was the lens mount for Minolta's excellent manual focus SLRs product lines from the 1960s thru the 1980s.

[Cato]

Thank you for the thorough answers, much appretiated