This sounds an interesting prjoect - how do you charge it? It is a DIY charger, or are there COTS options?

Ah, mine's only done half that so far, but then I have used live view and the flash quite a bit. Still impressive, though.

Thanks Dan - looks like the 7DayShop option is good value (and it seems sensible to avoid the eBay ones).

That looks good - I'll give one of those a try, thanks.

I think I know the answer to this already, but does anyone have any recommendations for third party batteries for the K-5?

I'm off on holiday in a few weeks and would like a second spare as an emergency backup, but don't really want to spend £50 on an OEM one.

My previous experience with cheap off-brand batteries in video cameras has been that performance and long-term life isn't great, but would be interested to hear how anyone who has tried third-party batteries in their K-5 or K-7 has got on with them.

Assuming you're looking at it from the camera side, it sounds like the focus ring has definitely slipped (or been put back together wrongly) as I'd expect the hyprefocal to be to the left of infinity.

Sorry; I spend most of my day working with engineers, immersed in acronyms!

By VM, I meant Virtual Machine, which is effectively a way of running an entire 'virtual' PC in software, from within your native OS (e.g. in this case, you could use it to run a Linux virtual PC from within your normal Windows OS).

I'd recommend having a play with Linux (Ubuntu is a good place to start). It's not for everyone and has its limitations but it's quite interesting and can be useful for things like this, or, as you say, booting from a live CD/DVD and recovering your data after a hard disk crash.

If you've got access to a linux box or VM, bulk resizing of images is dead easy using ImageMagick.

I've got a spare Tamron 28-75 f/2.8. Not a Sigma or Pentax, I know, but pretty highly regarded. PM me if it's of any interest.

I have a K100d body with similar symptoms; even with fresh lithium or fully charged NiMH batteries, it powers up briefly, but as soon as I try to fire the shutter, it reports that the battery has died and powers off.

A bit of googling suggested two possible causes:

- Calibration error with the voltage regulator on the main PCB (fixed by replacing the main PCB)
- Failed aperture control unit (the bit that stops down the lens when the shutter is fired)

I think the latter was more likely in my case as the camera appeared to work until actuation of the shutter. Either way, a repair didn't sound economical and I got a replacement. I still have the old one though, so I'd be interested to hear how you get on.