MX manual here.

Petekd,

come back at any time you feel the urge . . . and let us know how any of this helped you ! ! !

Try opening up the aperture a stop or three from f32. I think you'll find that your images will be even sharper. Most lenses are not at the best at max or min aperture. Try f16 or even f11 if you have enough light.

For setting exposure - the camera meters through through the lens with the mirror down. The light sensors surround the pentaprism/pentamirror.

To quench the flash when sufficient output has been generated - TTL Flash metering is done with the mirror up. The sensor is inside the mirror box and measures the light bouncing back from the film.

Two entirely different metering requirements and methods.

Store them in sensibly named folders to start with. Simple.

If you tend to use a zoom of that length mostly at the long end, then I'd suggest you try the SMCP-FA 80-320mm. It's a very good lens, works 100% with the Pentax digibods, and goes for less than £100.00 on that well known auction site. I have one and get good results from it. If you often need 400mm, then I can recommend the Sigma 135-400mm APO but of course, neither really fits the "general purpose" category.

28-300mm would seem to be general purpose . . . on film. On a digital body, I doubt it's wide enough at 42-450mm equivalent angle of view. It's almost certainly too long at 450mm end for hand held use on other than a K100D/K10D body. Even then, shake reduction might be a problem if the lens does not communicate with the body correctly.
Personally, I would choose the 16-45mm + 50-200mm DA lenses to suit a 'general purpose' requirement. Your image quality will be far superior and I doubt you'll be needing to change lenses too often.

Now I like Sigma lenses, some Sigma lenses at least. I have a 70-300mm Macro and a 135-400mm APO. Both excellent lenses . . . but . . .
. . . as for the 28-300mm, the numbers say it all. 28-300mm is almost 11x zoom ratio, and it's a slow f3.5 at the 28mm end, and a snail at f6.3 at the 300mm end. This lens has got to be loaded with compromises.

You can't really compare 2 zooms having such different ranges as 16-45mm and 28-300mm anyway, can you?

Be prepared to get a non-english manual with your camera. No real problem, you can download an english one from the Pentax web site.

Hama equipment is well made budget gear. I have a Hama video tripod for my camcorder and I'm please with it.

Be assured, whichever you choose, you are unlikely to be disappointed. My preference is for the K10D because it's weather/dust proof and has a larger sensor, 10.2Mp. Similarly weatherproofed lenses available May June '07. All of your existing lenses will work with the camera, even the screw mount lens with an adapter. This will only work in stop-down metering mode, with which there is an issue currently. See other threads.

Another advantage of the K10D is it's compressed .PEF RAW File. Using this, files end up smaller from this than my *istD, a 6Mp camera. Also it can save in Adobe's .DNG format. Post-processing support for RAW files in PEF format for the K10D is a bit limited at the moment. You basically have a choice of SIlkypix or the bundled software. PhaseOne seem to be dragging their heels about releasing an update to their Capture One product. Adobe's Camera Raw for Photoshop also works, as does Lightroom in DNG format (I haven't used it with PEF's so can't confirm).

The K10D has many features, too numerous to list here, that are not included in the K100D, wireless flash using the built-in pop-up is but one feature that I find very useful.

Personally, I would not even consider the Samsung camera. Essentially its the same hardware but the firmware is Samsung's own. Pentax has issued 2 updates to their K10D firmware since its release with another expected soon. Samsung . . . nothing.