It costs 599.00. That's cheaper than a K5 I believe.

Agree Pentax mustn't make this camera look like a one trick pony wrt weathersealing. But I think back to my friend's reaction to the fact that my K200D had weathersealing... he is not the type to do masses of research on which camera to buy (typical casual DSLR buyer), so had just walked into London Camera Exchange and gone with a Nikon D40 because he knew the Nikon brand and that was the only Nikon he could afford. When he looked at my K200D he was initially a bit dismissive, but he was extremely impressed that it was weathersealed and wished he had known about it.

I think the weathersealing thing is a very important USP of the camera and needs to be highlighted to customers, not hidden in the specs sheet.

I don't get it.

I was happy with my first series lens too; not sure if it was a better sample or the 6MP camera I used it with hid the flaws.

All three mkII/WR lenses I have had since then have had blurry CA at the edges though (but I'm sure if you saw a sample image from them at 800px it would look perfectly fine, as I'm sure the sample images on that kit lens thread are!)

Not really a plus point as such... they presumably just had 11 more things to seal

The low price and weathersealing are major plus points. The camera looks different (unlike the excellent but bland K200D) so buyers will look twice and actually notice that the camera offers WR - something unique in its price bracket. The lens point is very true, however the K30 should, IMO, draw in lots of new users with no immediate aspiration to go beyond a couple of kit lenses (to be honest that's propbably 80% of all users!)

That's a fantastic price, wow....

The Canon one (18-55 IS) is better according to Photozone.de, much sharper across the whole frame. My kit lens takes on the optical qualities of a glass paperweight at the edge of the frame at 18mm. However a kit lens only needs to be 'good enough' and the Pentax 18-55 is just that - and then you have the WR which is fantastic

Well the WR version does offer something pretty cool for the price. I have kept mine for the weather sealing (refuse to pay up for a 16-50). Kit lenses are meant to be boring, though aren't they? Acceptablefor most purposes but not so good that you aren't tempted to buy another lens (and succumb to LBA....) My issue with the kit lens isn't that it's boring, it's just a bit poor compared to the competition, especially at the edges. CA abounds.

It strikes me as a replacement for the K200d... so I reckon it will be intermediate between a new entry level model (or perhaps the K-01) and the top of the range APSC model (the K5 replacement).

The hands-on is already up at dpreview.

Interesting side by side with the K5. I know which camera's looks I prefer