as a last word on this from me Pentax has suffered a loss of competitiveness YES this is true BUT ask yourself WHY here is a few points to concider

Q/ a large proportion of lenses in the SMC range for instance are F4 why is this

A/ pentax kept the filter thread to 49mm so the owners of their system US dont have to buy shed loads of filters

Q/ why are pentax AF lenses are slower than thier commpetitors

A/ because pentax have kept the same K lens mount so that the owner of their system US dont have to change all of our lenses

Q/ why have pentax not produced a digital camera more than 6meg to keep up with the other s

A/ pentax had a 35mm digital chip camera the MZD which was never launched this was being developed in partnership with contax and phillips thay decided not to go ahead because thay could not justify the £2500 price tag it would have cost the owners of their system US


pentax only have one group of people in mind when thay design cameras and lenses THE OWNERS OF THEIR SYSTEM US not the board of directors and investors unlike canon nikon and minolta

IF YOU DECIDE TO GO FOR CANON OR NIKON CHECK OUT THE LENS SITUATION I SOLD MY D300 BECAUSE THE LARGE MAGORITY OF EOS LENSES DO NOT WORK ON THE DIGITAL CAMERA THIS IS THE SAME WITH NIKON CERTAIN LENSES DO NOT WORK ON THE DIGITAL CAMERAS AND WHEN THAY DO FIT THE FUNCTIONS ARE SO LIMITED THEIR IS NO POINT

this is my last post on this subject good luck in the future simon what ever you decide to do i hope this debate has helped cheers ali

FUJI CAMERAS INVENT PIXELS THE CCD SENSOR THAY USE ON THE 12 MEG CAMERA IS EFFECTIVE THE ACUAL AMOUNT IS 6 MEG BUT THAY HAVE "FOURTH LAYER TECHNOLOGY"

the way i was trying to put my own desision to stay with pentax ws the fact that i have three cases full of equipment all dedicated to pentax and to replace it all by chganging manufacturers would be approx £35,000 - £50,000 depending on systems C being the lowest and N the highest i wouldnt even look at M or O

in the motorsport field i can understand switching two the C or N system as you can hire a £5-8,000 lens instead of buying one

at the end of the day its down to your chosen field for instance i use my MEsupers outdoors and the superAs indoors with studio flash thay are a better studio camera than the MEs

i use the MZS for weddingsand motorsport but only on manual focus indoors again the superAs are a better indoor camera

the *istds is not a good studio camera it can over expose even with the built in flash the canon 300d was better with studio flash but it carnt use my pentax lenses especaily the imortal 85mm SMC but the *istd is fine in a studio then it has a pc plug

my argument for megapixels is that ink jet printers can only print so small and it come to the stage where you reach the minimum size you can physical make drops of ink if you get 4 drops of ink to say every megapixel and that is pushing the parameters of the printer then why have a camera that is 20 megapixal the printer hasent got a cat in hells chance of faithful reproduction

if pentax sell the 10 meg camera for half the price of canon nikon or minolta who will be kicking themselves

WELL IT WONT BE A PENTAX OWNER WILL IT

the only thing i will have to change when i buy the new pentax digital camera is the batteries

but i wont have to through half my lenses in the bin unlike the big three and all my accsesories will fit to woohoo

i have just bought a pentax *istds from jessops 17/06/2006 just go in and ask them to search the company for them
this is to back up my *istd

i work as a proffessional photographer ive used pentax since i was twelve years old (now 39)

i use in my photographic business

2 ME supers
2super As
2MZSs
1*istd
1*istds

and when the new 10 meg comes out ill have 2 of those as well

i dont use many new lenses i opt to use what have been the finest lenses in the world since the year dot PENTAX SMC

i admit i bought a 300D wanting to upgrade to a more fashonable make the one every body else uses but sold it and got an *istds instead

ive worked in motorsport and the N & C owners used to take the P#ss because i was using two ME supers but i wiped the smile off their faces with the crysal clear trannies that i got back which i sold to large corperations Volvo Audi to name drop

i stick with pentax its not the camera that makes the picture its the photographer

REMEMBER THIS pentax could have done what N C & M did thay changed lens mounts in order to accommodate auto focus which okay thay have fast units now which have left pentax i the shade a bit but pentax are loyal to their users and you can still use SMC lenses on the new cameras so why change all your kit

you can garuntee the others will change mounts again if thay need to somthing which i dont think pentax will ever do

lack of a descent camera shop in blackpool ABBEY PHOTOGRAPHIC who i may add are the authorised pentax dealer refuse to stock pentax full stop

i know the manager and staff at jessops so i get discount anyway i got another *ist ds for £378 two weeks ago so its not all bad

when jessops opened in blackpool it marked the closure of six independent camera shops in blackpool so im stuck with them locally anyway

their is a couple of good shops in lancaster and preston but its having the time i do tend to buy a lot off ebay but for some strange reason people seem to be hellbent on paying over the odds for cameras esspecaily from the copy camera people

all of my lenses (apart from the 18-55 which came with the body *istds) are SMC M and A lenses and all work perfectley on the camera

i even have a few manually stopped down lenses 300,400,500 which have manual stop down and thay work fine as does my freinds tasco spotting scope with a t2 mount

the assistant you were talking to was talking complete b#ll#cks and is obviously on a better bonus selling nikon equipment thay try it with me in jessops all the time with the exception of a couple of the staff and manager that know me very well

shall put it on my not to visit list along with iraq and egypt

another way of preventing dust is to keep your rear lens on your camera lenses clean and dust free

then even if you have gadget cases no matter how soft and gentle the interior may be keep your rear lens caps on your lenses

correct me if im not wrong but the problem with dust in digital cameras is caused by static build up rather than just dust like in 35mm cameras

so i take it that using say a kenro or simular compressed air duster is not a good plan then (not had to clean a ccd yet)

you could also safe gaurd against dust by changing lenses in a more dust free enviroment ie turn your back on a race track and change with your camera inside a coat instead of head-on to the action

after all prevention is the best cure (at least in an ideal world anyway)

CHEERS FOR THAT MATTMATIC A VALID POINT I THINK TWO 2GB CARDS IS THE WAY TO GO