The first thing to check is the dioptre adjustment on the viewfinder. Point the camera at a blank area (wall or sky) and adjust until the etched guide lines are sharpest. You don't need to focus the lens to do this and it's probably better defocused. This ensures you are seeing the image sharply on the ground glass.

There is so much DOF at long distances that a 50mm lens that won't focus on infinity is very unusual Also that another lens won't either really points away from the lenses being a problem. Try the above first and see what happens.

You are talking about an Avatar. This needs to be a small JPEG or GIF and you can sort this in My Settings>My Profile

A new thread to start off discussion on the subject.

Yes.

It looks like you've really answered your own question.

I can tell you that the Pentax 50-200mm and 55-300mm lenses are both excellent.

Put in a report ("report problem" at the bottom of this page) or send a PM to PentaxDan.

If you subscribe to the Pentax User Club you can upload more images. You also get the magazine.

Everybody is welcome here, just join in!

You're right that there was no specific rule, but there was always an assumption that members of a Pentax forum would be using Pentax (or Pentax made Samsung) cameras.

Just let it go this time, it's too late, but perhaps we could bear it in mind for future competitions.

Having read this, I'll ammend my suggestion to that you replace this with the K200D if you need to, and the camera will be almost identical, but with better resolution.

The dust spots are on the CCD, so you need to activate the menu item Sensor Cleaning, which opens the shutter so you can see the CCD. Make sure the battery is fully charged when you do this. Use a rocket blower, carefully, to blast any dust off the CCD. This has always disposed of the dust for us and you may not need to go further. If it doesn't work, then physical cleaning methods are the next step. Kits are available from Pentax and others.