Did you used the DAL35 btw?

Also with liveview when using contrast AF?
You should be comparing like for like, liveview is very different then normal shooting.

Glad you went Gwyn, I didn't had the time (work) and now I'm sick at home

In 2008 Pentax had only a small showroom but they had quite a big space for customers behind the stage. Last time it wasn't that bust there so it's good to see it's more busier now.

The stand now looks bigger than it was the last time but they did had 5 small pillars with the K-M on it on with a steel cable so that you could try them out yourself without waiting for one to be handed to you. Was that the same this time?

last time Canon was also almost had a whole hall, they were sharing it with Panasonic then.

Don't forget the 7FPS off the K5 vs the 5.2FPS from the K7 so the buffer fills faster, so with the K7 the camera has more time to process photos while capturing.
I think if you want to fill the buffer the K7 can do maybe 4 images in that time? since the K5 files are larger and the buffer filled faster, I would be surprised if it could do 2 images before the buffer is full.

Don't see why?
RAW is just the data from the sensor, so the sensor gives the DATA and the camera simple pack it in a file, so no noise reduction or anything is done by the PRIME II processor.

No but they do have a SP coating so if the front element is clean the water drops would pearl off.

Thank you for the nice comments.

Congratulation Nass.
Didn't had time to vote, sorry

I've also a simple gitzo ball head and I've looked at those as well.
I think it's very handy that the camera stays at roughly the same height if you switch from landscape to portrait mode.

I've tried the head out in the shop, they feel very good but they are quite expensive though and sadly don't have the cash for one

For the little bit extra I would go for the series 3 that can hold 8KG instead of the series 2 5KG.

That the difference between contrast AF and phase detection AF.
With Phase detection the camera know if to focus backward or forward and knows better how much it needs to focus.
With contrast the camera need to focus backward or forward to know if where to focus to and it seems the camera overshoots a little to see if the contrast improve and then goes back to the maximum contrast point.
The good thing is contrast AF is more accurate since you are measuring the focus on the actual photo.

I for one won't be planning to shoot a lot at ISO 6400 though, it's far more important how they compare at ISO 200 and ISO 400, any comparisons on that range?