Nothing to stop you buying an FD mount body, the pick of the lenses, a few rolls of black and white and the kit to develop negatives at home...

Did the writer of that article escape from the 1950s? Their attitudes to gender seem to date from around then!

I can't say I've noticed any Pentax being difficult to use, even the MX is an absolute doddle if you can read and understand a brief article on depth of field and how to use it. The marketoids seemed to get the idea that the K-m was specially designed to be simple and gave it to some real airheads (including one Youtube "review" where they actually commented on the chrome strip around the body without once showing a sample photo!) which is highly unfair. It deserves better than that.

I can't comment on the others, but I would say to keep the Pentax ones. If you're keen to shed one then sell the M 50mm f1.7, although, that said, I have two of these and an A series version. The M series is much nicer to use on film bodies as it has a metal aperture ring, while the plastic one on the A series can be a bit rough.

If it came with a body then it was probably the original kit lens - I always feel it a shame to split these things up after so many years.

Which version is the 18-55mm? The DA L/WR/MK2 version has much better reviews than the MK1, I was quite happy with mine for some time and still use it if I need an ultra wide angle lens.

I would say to look for a Pentax-F 35-70mm if you can find one for sane money, they're great performers and make an excellent walkabout lens due to weighing next to nothing and being fairly compact.

Actually, they did - http://www.camerapedia.org/wiki/Minolta_RD-3000

I have never seen an RD-3000 though, and I can't see 2.7mp being particularly stellar in performance terms...

What's odd is that he gives favourable reviews to older Pentax gear - look at his opinions on the M series lenses and they wouldn't be out of place here.

I have one simple request for Polaroid: Make a battery for their Pogo printer which will hold its charge for more than 7 hours!

The battery in mine (and in two others I've seen) will go flat within a day even when removed from the printer. I wouldn't be so bothered about it only being able to print 15 photos on a full charge if it would actually hold that charge for a few days, other than this stupid design fault it's great fun.

The puzzling one is that Minolta invested a good deal of money in their APS SLR, and produced a surprisingly complete set of lenses to go with it. They won't, however, work on the Sony cropped sensor bodies. Given that the sensor is the same size as an APS frame why on earth didn't they consider this? It'd give them a chance to force people to buy a whole new set of lenses when they went from cropped to full frame!

I will admit to a sneaking urge to buy a Vectis S1, if I ever see a stupidly cheap example. I can see them turning collectible like older cameras which used now-unavailable film formats, especially given the low sales figures (APS being principally aimed at point and shoot users and in any case hitting the market just as digital was gaining ground).

To be fair, the FA-J 18-35mm will work on 35mm without vignetting. I suspect that's why they still seem to go for more than the 18-55mm despite reportedly not being as good a lens.

I can't help but think that "Pentax Automatic 18-35mm..." is in fact a FA-J 18-35mm f4-5.6. Another case of someone who struggles to spot ":" as opposed to "." on a lens!

I still find it odd how the first Pentax AF lenses (disregarding the earlier 35-70mm which only works with the ME-F - although it has decent reviews as a lens from what I've read) seem to be considered the finest. One wonders why Pentax bothered investing in replacing them rather than just fine-tuning the designs!

Just make sure that you're getting the SMC version, as they also did a Pentax-F 70-200mm without it (and Takumar-F badged 70-200mm and 70-210mm without it).