K10D or.......

Sorry Matt, no can do, mine's been confiscated by my financial advisor. She advised me that I must not spend any more money on toys . . . or else ! ! ! ! !

She also has no interest in solving this mind boggling conundrum of coated, or not coated, that is the question? Whether 'tis nobler in the factory, to split production lines . . . .

Can't understand her myself , she just doesn't understand the importance of . . . stuff.

I thought "Coat" vs "No Coat" would've been understood

Matt, we live in spain . . . coats ? ? ? They don't come into it.

That the lenses are coated is beyond doubt - you can see that they are. The 50-200mm lenses that I examined side by side seemed to have identical coating relections, so I deduce from that that the coatings were probably the same.

aha at last we have someone who has seen both lenses at the same time. Good old John!

sounds like the coatings are the same then, and if they are the same between those two lenses it is reasonable to assume they are on all of them.

I think Mannesty probably has it right with his theory about Samsung not being allowed to make a big deal about it.

If it was applied before grinding, there would be none left!

It's obviously pretty much the final stage prior to assembly.

And my guess is that the Schneider lenses DO have SMC coating because not to coat them with the same stuff would cost more.

G

I was referring to the edges George. I agree that it'd be pretty well useless to apply a coating to the surface(s), then grind it off.

So, now that we've more or less determined that Samsung's Schneider lenses are in fact unmodified (except the label) Pentax lenses, does this help the OP's decision making process?

Not really! Jacobs by London Bridge had both in stock today so I had a few minutes looking at them:

The four buttons down the left hand side of the GX10 are flat and large which I quite liked, but they are the sort of design that could start malfunctioning. The same 4 buttons on the Pentax are smaller and feel like your pressing the button directly rather than via a cover. Does that make sense?

The control wheel for the AF mode is a nicer design on the Pentax, the 'knurling' is deeper so it's easier to move. Having said that I very rarely use anything other than selectable AF.

The design of the metering mode switch and program dial on the Samsung meant that as I changed the metering mode I risked changing the program by mistake. The Pentax didn't seem to have this 'problem'!?!?

On the lens front, I already have the Sigma 70-300 APO so I can't see when I'd want the 50-200, although the guy in Jacobs suggested that if Warehouse Express are selling the GX10 + 18-55 + 50-200 for £599 then they must have mis-priced it as there is not enough margin in the hardware to sell at that price and still make a profit. Whether that's true I don't know?

Having both in front of me I was more drawn to the Pentax as the controls you really use all the time seemed to be a nice design than the Samsung. Also from what I've heard the Pentax after sales service is far better than Samsung, so I think I could be swayed towards the green rather than the blue....

I used to be indecisive, but I'm not so sure anymore...

But seriously, you've made the case, so what are you waiting for? Every day you delay is one less day to enjoy your purchase!

But when you do take the plunge, just forget about it and don't torment yourself any further...there's a nice learning curve awaiting you to take all your attention.

Good luck, hope you make your decision soon.

From what I have seen at a factory that makes the lenses for glasses, they had a lot of possibilities to apply different coatings to different lenses.
So you can, in theory apply different coatings to different lenses.

Nikon went firther than that and used to say that they altered the coating for various lenses to enhance their particular design requirements.

Ther's no saying that the SMC coating of modern Pentax lenses is the same as on a SMC Takumar. No doubt there has been progress.

I think the Pentax/Samsung question revolves around whether or not it would be cost effective to bother having two coating processes, although I'm sure that it is indeed possible.

If my understanding is correct (and I have a first in the physics of optics which suggests that it is at least close), then the coating would have to differ not only between lens designs but between optical elements in the same lens.

The original SMC coating which provided such good results on normal optical glass would be useless and possibly even detrimental on any of the modern special glasses used in lens construction. These glasses have different refractive indices from normal glass, and the required composition of an effective multi-coating scheme would have to compensate for this. Even the fairly modest 50-200 contains at least one ED glass element to earn it's 50-200 ED designation.

All the more reason why it would be difficult to change the coatings for the Samsung lenses. I would have thought doing so would be making them different for the sake of it and would add to costs.

Also, if only the cosmetic finish at the end of the line is different then the lenses could be diverted to the Pentax or Samsung final stages very easily and quickly depending on the demand.

Studying the Physics of Optics by the way sounds like very interesting. Did you continue in a field to which it was directly relevant or some other unrelated field?

Good point – I hadn’t thought of that.

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As the coating will be put on the optics last I guess it would be possible to supply Samsung with un-coated components, but I think it is unlikely – I expect as others have said there are probably licensing agreements which prevent Samsung from using the SMC name as part of their advertising. It is to Pentax’s advantage to appear to have something to offer over the cheaper Samsung version.

The last two on eBay fetched £103 and £114 + postage. Fortunately (for the sellers), eBay buyers don't seem to bother to Google before bidding.

I got one from www.pcwb.com for about £70 before discovering the Curry's offer. Maybe I didn't Google hard enough! Actually these two companies are owned by the same group.

Anyway, the lens is sharp enough and amazingly small & light. Great for travelling light.