This is true since all laptop screens are pale and fuzzy approximations to what one really should be seeing. But how large? How good? How much money?

For me something in the 22-23" range is large enough, especially as I use a second monitor to hold all the bits and bobs I don't want cluttering the main screen.

A full colour gamut (over AdobeRGB), 12-bit panel and hardware calibration are minimum requirements for a professional monitor. Otherwise you simply do not know if what you are seeing is true to the image. One candidate is the 22" EIZO ColorEdge CG222W which comes with a monitor hood to protect from glare and a screen cleaning kit. It automatically adjusts to the ambient light levels. Native resolution is 1680x1050 (not HD). It would run you £900.

Since I didn't have that kind of money, I went for the 23" Dell U2311H which is a full HD (1920x1080) 8-bit e-IPS panel. It has excellent colour and responsiveness, runs cool & quiet, and (important for me) has a matte anti-reflective coating. You can pick one up for £260. I found a unit even cheaper than that and am very happy with it.

"Like most I have battery life issues with both the K100D and Super models"

Most people have never had battery issues. Like many I use Eneloops and couldn't be happier. Before that I used several other brands and they were OK too.

"the camera body is effectively dead"

I am sorry to hear about that! Mine worked fine until I dropped it off a waterfall... and even after that it was OK, though the viewfinder was mucky. I have never heard of the battery compartment failing but anything that can happen will... eventually. If it is under warranty get it seen to.

"I had a fatal failure on the K100 that required a warranty replacement of the main board. Currently I have had no issues with either the K10 and K20 bodies. But I am lossing faith in Pentax. "

I would lose faith with a company that didn't honour warranties. But not the other way around. Every brand has failures and Pentax is no different. If anything, Pentax cameras are built to take a lot more abuse than other brands at the same price point.

Nice look!

It might be the newer cameras have fixed this. That would be great! The K50/1.2 is one of the lenses I used in the past, but I have now sold it off.

Manual aperture and stop-down metering, yes. Or just put the camera in "M".

Older lenses may have poorer coatings. They will also not be optimised for digital sensors, which generally manifests itself as poorer micro-contrast. However, in other ways they are superior to your average digital lens: better build, better manual focus feel, etc.

If you are a manual-everything tactile shooter, get a recommended older lens and discover what they are like for yourself. You may find a new love!

To be honest I find using older lenses annoying, since the stop-down metering is rarely accurate. Better to just go full manual and be done with it.

That said, I do use old lenses in this way, when I want a different experience. But they are too slow and prone to exposure error for me to take to a gig.

If Pentax would fix the crippled mount and the metering the story would be different.

That's wacky but dying to be used for a portrait.

You're not going to do better than the Lester Dine 105mm. I had mine fixed in London last summer and afterwards the tech called me up specially to remark "that's quite a lens!". He'd never worked on one before and had obviously noted the quality of the test shots.

Where the heck did you find a A* 300mm in London? When I was there I found very few Pentax lenses.... none basically.

Have fun with the new camera and your lenses and don't think of buying anything for a while! Learning to photograph is more important than being a consumer.

But when you do, I recommend a fast 50, so you have new options. Maybe even a Pentax A 50mm f/1.7 which will force you to use manual focus but in return will give you exemplary image quality for about fifty quid.