Well that makes my mind up for me anyway - definitely sticking with the K20D for a while longer, Pentax will need to try a little harder if they want my cash!!

Considering the already increased prices here in the UK any further rises must seriously risk sales - I can't imagine that Pentax lens sales are particularly buoyant at the moment anyway due to the state of the economy and the impact it is having on peoples spending power, the 2nd hand market seems pretty active though.

OK, if it's just a case of old stock laying around I'm not buying for a little while anyway so hopefully they will all have cleared the shelves!! I'll be buying from SRS too just for piece of mind

Sorry to hear that this issue has raised its head again...my K5 purchase looks like it's going on hold for a while longer until the situation becomes clearer

Simon

Having bought the DA12-24 just before my trip to China last year I found it invaluable, not only is it good for landscapes but brilliant too for architecture, now I won't travel without it - it's that which prompted me to look for streamlining elsewhere so I'll be compromising on the 17-70+55-300 & taking the 18-250 instead, the 18-135 unfortunately won't allow me to do this.

It's a pity that Pentax didn't develop the 18-250 further, adding WR & DC, but I guess they had to pay Tamron a substantial amount of cash so went with their own more limited range option instead.

Yes, it's not exactly a great "feature", no doubt I'll keep forgetting to take the lock off.

I have the DA55-300 too and it's excellent but I wanted to reduce the lenses I carry around when travelling as I always take the DA12-24 too so my travel kit is now DA12-24, 18-250, FA50mm 1.4 - the DA17-70 is my main landscape lens together with the 12-24.

Lens now sold

Probably but I think mainly due to the increased range & WR - I don't own it so can't compare but from what I've seen so far I don't think IQ is quite as good as the 17-70, it certainly seems to exhibit a fair bit more CA too.

I thought about buying the 18-135 but for me the range, whilst better than the 17-70, isn't so significant as to not need a telephoto too, unlike the tamron/pentax 18-250 which from a range point of view is a much better walkabout option.

I'm sure WR would come in useful from time to time but during my 3yrs with a DSLR I've never really felt the need for it - that's whilst living in Wales too!!

I forgot to mention in my original post that the lens is supplied in original box etc...I can add a photo if requested but it's basically a photo of a new lens!!

For another 7.50 I'll throw in a brand new Lowepro 1M case which it fits perfectly, so

Lens only (boxed etc) - £120, with Lowepro case £127.50

Payment can be by Paypal gift or bank transfer


Simon

Fair enough, I know normally there's no difference but the post by Smeggy etc about converting PEFs to DNG caught my eye - seems effort for no gain