3rd shot is a cracker.

The TTL flash annoys me (I eventually bought a AF360) compared to the *istDS, however I haven't found the metering with older lenses to be a problem - the K10D meters accurately wide open so I do that then work out myself what the exposure should be stopped down. It's not difficult although it does slow me down a little bit (possibly no bad thing).

No brainer for me - personally I'd rather have the 16-50 than those 3 primes, especially given it's faster (and quite possibly sharper) than the 21mm which for me would be the most useful focal length of the primes mentioned.

That's about the same price as I paid for a second hand older version of the lens (mine is an APO Super II) so the buy-it-now price seems pretty good. The postage costs look high and I don't know what the import duty is like so it's still worth comparing the price to what you can get a new or second hand version for locally.

I've been quite impressed with my lens - I knew it had a decent reputation but if anything it's a bit better than I expected. Even wide open it's at least ok at most focal lengths however, as chirpy suggests, it's definitely worth stopping down to F8 at 300mm. I posted a couple of example shots, including a 100% crop, taken at 300mm and F8 at my pbase site - http://www.pbase.com/niblue/sigma_70_300

Also while it's no match for a dedicated macro lens it's close focus abilities are quite impressive and it's certainly good enough to get an idea of what macro is all about.

I've never been a particularily patriotic purchaser (except where whisky is concerned).

My current car is British built although it was bought because it was a Honda, not because it was built in Britain. My previous car was also a Honda but actually made in the USA.

That's me stuffed then...

That was sort of my thought as well - posting something from my office would be obvious but uninteresting but almost anything else would require a description.

Interesting topic this one but I was just about to post a shot there before realising it'd be almost meaningless without an explanation of why!

For an A4 printer at up to £250 then I think the R800 is still the logical choice. I've only had mine for a month or so but I've been very impressed with it, including print speed.

I think the Raw file captures what the sensor saw - the colour balance is applied after that so I don't see how quality could be affected.