Their website of items for sale doesn't seem to have been updated for quite some time. I suppose they stopped using it for that purpose.

I've never owned an LX, but I'd love to have one. I do own and use quite a multitude of film cameras though. Many of the ones I've bought have needed a CLA, most notably two K2s, the top-of-the-line SLR before the LX. Well-built cameras will last longer but they won't work without being looked after.

Just because you buy a Mercedes rather than a Citroen doesn't mean it will never need maintenance.

Film cameras can be very, very cheap these days but often they don't work until they've had a CLA, so if you're buyinh one for serious use and you want it to be very reliable, the cost of a CLA has to be factored into the purchase.

Excellent portraits, if possible even better than the ones with the 50mm you did a while back.

Yep, I saw this a few months ago. It's very well done.

Someone should try it on film in the meantime.

The 70mm is great, and a more useful focal length on digital in my opinion (absolutely ideal for portraits) and very, very small. I haven't tried the 100mm macro though.

As the blotch is quite clearly defined, I'd say it's likely on the sensor rather than in the optics, but I could be wrong. Either way, if it's out of guarantee I think your only option is to try to take it apart and remove the offending particle. It's not a sensor fault because that wouldn't show up in this way, it would show up as lines across the whole image, it's definitely a particle stuck somewhere inside.

The colour balance is also way off, but I assume you didn't bother to correct it because the blotch is rather more of a problem.

This is true, and I think a good print will always be better than a monitor, but printing or displaying a image larger doesn't make it better. I can't improve my photography by enlarging it (more's the pity).

Forget the originals, they're way over-priced and rubber ones offer greater protection in case of drops and you don't have to worry about them breaking in your bag.

Rubber lens hoods come in two varieties - long and short. For the 50mm I'd recommend the long one and for the 28mm the short, as the long one might be two long and cause vignetting. The longer ones can be collapsed down, but they tend to get in the way of focusing rings if you do that.

Long: http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/49mm-Collapsible-3-Stage-Screw-in-Rubber-Lens-Hood-for...

Short: http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/49mm-Rubber-Lens-Hood-Orion-branded-ORN125-Brand-New-T...

I think it's 70-210 rather than 70-200. Apparently it's a pretty decent lens despite suffering from the two main problems of the F series - noise produced by the focusing mechanism and being really ugly.

I have a copy waiting for me but haven't tried it yet. Reviews on the US forum are here:

http://www.pentaxforums.com/lensreviews/SMC-Pentax-F-70-210mm-F4-5.6-Zoom-Lens.h...