New Nikkor zoom lens rumors.

What do you mean by this exactly? What exactly do you need to improve right now?

I went from a D80 to a D7000, and the same 18-200 gave me much better (sharper, more detailed) results on the D7000, can't think of a reason why the switch from a D90 would give you less good results. I recently switched to a 18-300mm as a travel lens which is even better and has more reach. Not up to my 24-70/70-200 but that's just fine for it's purpose, as just like the 18-200 it get's excellent results, especially considering it's range.

No to dive into the wrong discussion, but have you checked/played with the focus fine tuning of your D7000? I know that visibly improved the sharpness with my 18-200.

In my opinion the 24mm on the wide end is ok for a walkaround lens on DX. I sure do prefer the 18mm, but you get used to it.

In real life you won't see a lot (if any) difference switching to a 16-85mm, at least i didn't. Choosing a 24-70mm will give you better iq. Main advantage of something like the 24-70 is the faster focus (if you need it), the 2.8 at the entire range and the nicer bokeh.

Could you be a bit more vague;-) I think what you describe it the holy grail of walkaround lenses:-).

I think the most "concrete" rumour for a -probably more affordable-fixed aperture-better iq-walkaround lens for DX is a 16-85mm-f4. But I don't know if the 85mm can be considered as "reach"..

Only guess so far is a patent request from Nikon, that's it....