Just to be clear, the links I posted were not about any kind of hack.

There is a perfectly well-behaved (I've tried it) Windows application with which you can switch to debug mode (and then leave it in Debug mode for as long as you like), even with the proper 1.3 firmware.

This gives you the ability to use SDM lenses, and also the ability to fix focussing issues, albeit with only one setting for all lenses.

The hack people refer to is where you replace the header in the 1.1 firmware, using a hex editor I imagine, so that the camera thinks it's later than the one it already has. I haven't tried that, though. I expect you would have to use that to be able to reinstall 1.1 over 1.3.

I take it you're using an early firmware?

You can have your cake and eat it if you use firmware 1.3 to get SDM, together with a little application that you use over USB to put the K10D into debug mode.

There are lots of references - a few are collected here, and from others in that thread.

Yes, I much prefer that lettering - much less intrusive. I think having it at the bottom rather than the top is better too.

Just to be really picky, something I wondered about after I commented the first time: was there any more at the bottom of the picture, or is what we see all there is? The crop is just a touch tight around the feet, is all.

Just being fussy, though - I'd be very pleased with that picture if I'd taken it.

OMG.

You couldn't make it up !!!!!

Amazing.

That was my first reaction too. .

What an extraordinary image. I'm amazed at how the absence of colour can fool the eye.

A careful look makes it clear that it's not a cabbage, but the rose has such a lot of dense petals that I really think it's not that obvious until you look.

Could we see the colour version? I'm assuming it's not green

(Actually, on second thoughts, how about a green version too... it will look even more like a cabbage and therefore be an amazing illusion.)

Sorry, I'm sure this wasn't the effect you intended . But I can't help the way I saw it!

Note to the real John Riley...

John, someone's hijacked your account and is posting under your name. He may also be buying your wife lenses!

I know that post can't really be JR, since the real McCoy would never use a non-Pentax lens...

I had a sneaking suspicion it would be quite a way short of the 320mm extreme.

My (admittedly quite brief) dalliance with the 80-320 left me quite disappointed, especially at the long end, which is the whole point of such a zoom.

I'd be interested in your impression of it beyond, say 280mm. On the basis of the one I had, the extra 20mm over the 55-300 isn't worth the lack of definition.

There's no EXIF on that shot - was it right at the long end?

The full size version you get by clicking on the photo is even better than the resized one the forum software imposes.

The detail in the body is excellent - very clear without being oversharpened.

The shallow DOF has led to the tail being a little blurred, but this just takes the eye to the terrific colour in the wing, and the great body detail.

To be picky, a slightly smaller aperture would have given you the DOF to get the head as sharp as the body, but this is very marginal.

My preference would be for less intrusive framing, possibly with less fancy lettering in a colour that contrasted less with the rest of the frame.

But the picture itself is great.

I've had my K10D for nearly three years, never heard of this one, so congratulations on a very unusual problem!

Does everything else appear to work?

For example, the 'self-timer' beep option is ticked in the menu, and when you take a self-timer photo, the red LED (front and rear) flashes until it releases the shutter, but there's no beep to accompany the flashing?

As Gartmore says, it is pretty quiet. You get ten seconds of slow, and two seconds of fast beeping to listen out for with the 12s self timer, so perhaps worth making sure.