Saw elsewhere that in mainland Europe the MSRP is 399 euro. That's around £330 I think.

Any of our mainland Europe members able to confirm or deny?

I'm not suggesting these faults aren't associated with water ingress, but I've seen them reported on a number of occasions by other users without any mention of water.

The pop up flash - just buy a cheap(ish) hot-shoe mounted flash-gun.

The function dial - think it was WD40?

In any event, a search here and on other Pentax forums might prove fruitful.

Welcome to the Forum, although it seems you've been lurking a while? All we Pentaxians have to come out eventually.

Looking forward to seeing some of your work.

Red dot on the mount. White line on the body.

Not necessarily. Lazy focussing might just be down to lack of use.

FWIW I run my SDM lenses every couple of weeks for a few minutes, focusing from near to far, etc, and so far no issues.

The kit lens is screw drive, so won't have the SDM issues.

Now (I hope) you're completely over your illness perhaps you and the camera/lens will benefit from getting out and about.

The 17-70 is an SDM lens, and in my experience can get a little 'lazy' if not used regularly. Also, unfortunately, SDM lenses do fail.

As to low light levels, might be a different issue inherent in all 17-70's and/or your K10D.

Presumably as you've raised these issues they are new to your use of both bits of kit?

Not over-looking another one was for sale on the Forum at the same time for less

Don't know if this is good, but worth a look.

Here's the link to the UK site;

link

But maybe cheaper through their US site if you can sign up?;

link

Wonder if they got their marketing strategy wrong when they decided not to sell on DVD?

Peter. Reading my earlier response I was a little curt I feel. My apologies.

To explore the subject a little more, I do appreciate that natural products are more likely to harbour or develop problems, but it does beggar the question as to why Pentax do still provide a leather pouch with the Limited lenses. Is it then better to go for the synthetic cases? Won't this impact the resale value of Limited lenses, i.e. a new owner would expect the leather case?

Just by the by, SRS sell what I'm after. Just under £15 delivered!

Point taken, but the latest Limiteds come in these.