The MTFs provided by Nikon confirm what many here are saying, reviews and my own experience with them. From sharpness and contrast perspective they are both excellent, but the 400 (as you'd expect) is better. Duh.
My interpretation is that the zoom would have softer corners than the prime, although hardly discernable. However, when cropped or with a TC, or when shooting really detailed subjects, the difference would be noticeable, certainly TC+Crop. On a 24mp body there is probably no difference.
For those not familiar with reading it, the lines measure sharpness and contrast (big components of IQ), 1 along the vertical axis being maximum (good) and the horizontal axis being distance from center in mm. A straight line higher that 0.9 is really good. The red is for 10 lines/mm and blue is 30 lines/mm. The solid is for the diagnol and the dashed is for lines perpendicular to the diagnol.
My interpretation is that the zoom would have softer corners than the prime, although hardly discernable. However, when cropped or with a TC, or when shooting really detailed subjects, the difference would be noticeable, certainly TC+Crop. On a 24mp body there is probably no difference.
For those not familiar with reading it, the lines measure sharpness and contrast (big components of IQ), 1 along the vertical axis being maximum (good) and the horizontal axis being distance from center in mm. A straight line higher that 0.9 is really good. The red is for 10 lines/mm and blue is 30 lines/mm. The solid is for the diagnol and the dashed is for lines perpendicular to the diagnol.
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