Pentax instruction manual

Hi everyone, I registered to air this comment:
I was given a new Pentax *ist DL for Christmas but the instruction manual that came with it is in French. There was also a CD with it that fortunately is in English, and I have also downloaded instructions in PDF format from the Pentax UK website. However, I struggle with these, it's just not the same as quickly looking something up in a booklet, and flipping back and forth through the pages. Also I would like something I can carry with me when I travel. So, I emailed Pentax UK to ask if I could buy a manual. They soon replied to say yes - and here's the rub - the price is GBP 20 including postage and packing. I nearly fell off my chair with amazement. That's 38.75 US Dollars, or 30 Euros at today's exchange rates. At that price they can keep it! What are other forum users' opinions on this, please?

Just go the website and download one.

G

If you read my message, George, I have downloaded it from the website, all 208 pages of it. My point is that I don't find it so easy to find what I want that way, nor from the CD, and I don't have anything to carry with me fro reference when I'm out and about or when I go away. I was wondering what other forum members thought of Pentax wanting GBP 20 (38.75 US Dollars) for a manual. I think it's a bit of a rip-off.

Hi itsme,

you can print off the manual from the PDF file. That's the biggest benefit of PDFs.

Open the PDF file, and click F1. This will open the Help menu. Click on Printing (fifth one down) in the left hand pane, and then click on Printing Adobe PDF documents on the right. This will explain how to resize the pages and set up the document for printing.

It may take a bit of messing around to start with, but it will work. That's what the Pentax manuals are produced from.

Hope that helps,

EDIT: Welcome to the forum as well.

Cheers

Liam

Well you could print the manual from the PDF, but I'm not sure I'd want to use that much ink and paper! It might be cheaper to pay the £20!

The price does seem high, but it is a very thick manual of some 237 pages, and to be fair the older 32 page manuals come in at around £4.50, so I suppose it depends how you look at it.

The manual comes free with UK stock, a small benefit of buying from a UK source.

Perhaps there are some manuals on eBay? I'll go and have a look now!

Thank you. Liam, it looks as though that is what I am going to have to do. Anything's better than paying GBP 20 for a manual. 208 pages of manual at two pages to a side of A4 paper, four pages to a sheet, will bring it down to 52 sheets of A4, and fewer if I don't print all the "Don't use the camera under water" type of advice. But please, don't suggest I print more pages to a sheet, because I won't be able to read it!

It does sound a bit OTT, then sods law dictates that you pay your £20 and wait a week for it to arrive, only to find the £20 is to cover the cost of a Pentax employee printing it off from PDF and stapling it together!

C'est La Vie

Try selling the French manual on ebay to offset the cost. Oh and welcome to the forum.

If you want people to read your messages, try using paragraphs. Why? Because when people are confronted by a dense mass of text, they just skim, and may miss what the writer thinks are important points.

There IS a benefit in taking the trouble to write properly. You should try it some time.

G

I downloaded the English manual for my Ds. I had a Dutch one with the camera. The Dutch wasn't a real problem for me, but it was just easier in English. Anyway my OH printed it out for me on the firms laser printer , double sided, two pages per side. Have to get the old reading glasses out to read it but otherwise it is fine.

Itsme,

Did you buy the camera from Pixmania? They have a habit of importing cameras from overseas with foreign-language printed manuals.

To be fair, Pixmania are French, so a French manual isn't foreign to them.

That doesn't excuse their rudeness. It might explain it, but not excuse it. Almost every other company like Pixmania (non-UK parent company) that I know of takes the trouble to procure UK-centric items (manuals, mains plugs etc) for sale in UK.

Pixmania are ripping UK customers off by taking advantage of the disparity in tax between buying in France, and selling in UK. It may even be illegal, but I don't want to go down that road.

Yes, my Christmas present did come from Pixmania.

Camera and lens were in their individual cartons and they were shipped in a large cardboard box, rattling about loose inside with no styrene chips or any other packaging. We were far from impressed with that.

There was also an electrical adapter plug loose in the box - a 3-pin 13 amp plug into the base of which a continental 2-pin plug can be fitted. It will come in handy but God knows why it was sent, it isn't needed.

I have printed the manual from Pentax website. It took an hour and a quarter on our LaserJet, 4 pages to an A4 sheet (both sides) and it's now in a twinlock binder. Too big for my camera bag, but better than twenty quid!.

If the kind person who gave you the camera had looked at Pixmania's site, they might have seen that Pixmania supplies European spec goods, not UK, and warns that manuals may not be in English.

Since Pentax UK supplies English manuals with everything they sell, there isn't much call for them to stock extra ones. They therefore have to order them specially, which costs time.

G

Price for K10D body Pixmania France : 949 euro, price Pixmania Holland 944 euro, Price Pixmania UK (after conversion) 947 euro.

Where's the rip off there?????

Price at Konijnenberg Holland btw is 949 euro for the body only so Pixmania are not much cheaper.

More interesting question might be why the K10D is a consumer level DSLR and for instance a D70 or a EOS30 an expert level according to Pixmania.