Aculux is an excellent all rounder and will produce beautiful gradation in the negatives. More recently I favoured FX-39 which makes for really compact and crisp grain. Very nice with Kodak Tri-X.

I don't see on the face of it anything different about the forum you've indicated. All forums are pretty much of this pattern (so is this one) although there are unfortunately still a few around like the AP forum, a design I'm not particularly fond of.

I now use an X90 for my eBay photos as composing the shots on the back screen whilst on a tripod has proved quite convenient. LiveView on a DSLR could be used in a similar way, but the X90 advantage is the ability to simply switch in macro focusing settings without having to change lenses.

So no doubt at all that this is a useful and versatile camera. It could be as much as many people will ever need.

Sure, I think the thing to do is to make a Report and IT will look at how it works for you. This is found via Report Problem/Suggestion at the bottom of the page.

There's a "new posts" button and also a recent posts button. I'm not quite sure what you're looking for as posts unread since last visit are also highlighted by green markers. Can you explain that in more detail please?

Then I've been incredibly lucky too! Monitor, printer, PU magazine, all show very closely the same colours.

The revamp is mainly about the website itself, perhaps most of us are relatively happy with the forum. After all, forums keep to a pretty similar pattern, which is useful in that it's not confusing when using several of them.

If you want to upload images without hotlinking that facility has been provided in the Gallery section of the website.

The SMC Pentax-DA 18-250mm is an excellent lens for travel. It's compact and produces nice sharp images. It focuses usefully close as well.

It can sometimes be found new, but more usually second hand. There is a Tamron 18-250mm which is essentially the same lens, but without the Pentax livery and presumably with different coatings.

Sue uses one of these and she produces some staggeringly good images with it. Some say better than mine, but I wouldn't presume to comment on that...

f8 gives more DOF than f6.3, but whether or not that is better depends on your image making requirements. However, with a 500mm lens there's precious little DOF anyway, so the lenses need to be used with suitable subjects where any perceived disadvantage can be turned into an advantage.

I've seen effective fashion shots with a 500mm, but it takes a bit of thought.

The starting point could be the lenses that you have now. If we know what these are, then the next step towards wider angles may be easier to suggest.

For example, if you are using the 18-55mm, then the 12-24mm Pentax lens would be an obvious choice, although hardly low priced.

Other manufacturers offer similar wide angle zooms at lower prices.