Do lens converters degrade quality?

[dahwws]

I was recently looking into buying a Canon T2i because that is widely recognized as the best cheap camera for HD capture. The thing is, my dad has a rather large collection of lenses but their for Nikon cameras. He said I could use them, but if I get the T2i I won't be able to. I looked into getting a lens converter, but my dad said that it would degrade the quality. Is this true? If it is, does anyone know a good Nikon camera? Or is it worth it to get the T2i and a 18-55 for a bit extra and build my lens collection from there?

 

[stef]

While it's true that it's a sensor issue, it is also affected by the lens - the sharper a lens is, the more likely it is to render fine details sharply which can make moiré worse. With cameras that are known for significant aliasing & moire issues it can actually be better to have a lens that is slightly softer.

Ah, right, that makes sense since that's essentially what the anti-aliasing does by the camera.

The old MF lenses have a bit worse contrast than my modern lenses, but also have very little dropoff on the edges, so it would make sense that they would also display less moire and have a nice, even picture.

Of course with the lower quality lenses, that means we're definitely pushing their limits, which was the whole point of my big post above.