Hi All
I'm new here, have enjoyed reading your posts.
Can you guys help, Ive read quite a few reviews (but) need some bottom line help.
I'm wanting to make the right choice with purchasing my entry level dslr,
I was going to buy a 400d with sigma ex lenses (have to watch my wallet), until i read about the Pentax k10, and the reviews were saying that this is a competitive camera against the Canon 30d, the reviews did not mention the 400d which is about the same price as the k10 (a $grand less than the 30d)
Bottom line, which is best... Hope you guys can help
much appreciated.
All the best
Baffle

That is a very open ended question. If you ask yourself a few well placed questions you can answer the choice selection yourself.

Will you be shooting heavily in low light?
What lenses from each company will make you happy?

The Canon's perform better in low light. If you rarely venture into the ISO 800 and up world then you can't make a bad choice. The Pentax feature set - meaning the body itself and not the pictures from it that you hold in hand will run circles around the Canon cameras - almost all of them.

But if you plan on shooting at ISO 800 and higher and the quality is mission critical, then the Canon will run circles around the Pentax.

To add to your suffering, the 30D is a better choice than the XTI if you are doing low light photography of sports or kids. It has expanded features that will make a difference in the picture, and a personal observation is I like the pictures from the 30D better than the XTi.

So now you can see where the cameras fit into the puzzle, now you have to decided what parts are the most important to you and you will arrive at your answer. That's my opinions, I hope they help.

Peter

Thank you for your response,
My lack of knowledge makes things harder,
Read more posts on the pentax which I found after posting.
Your answer is much appreciated
Yours
Baffle

The Pentax K10D looks like a great alternative. It seems better built and sealed than the Rebel XTI or 30d, it has nice features and image quality in RAW is superb from the reviews ive seen. Shoot straight to jpg and you loose some detail and quality but not much.

So am I right in saying that the Pentax body is built better but the image quality is not as good as Canon?.
Would the image quality between the 400d(XTI)and the Pentax be on par with each other?
Im probably wanting the best of both worlds
May be the 30d is the way to go and just save a few more bucks
Thanks for your help
Mark
Peter, was it a big difference between the 400 and the 30d in low light?

Good reviews are at dcresource.com.

You can also go to dpreview.com.

Generally I found in those reviews, that the Pentax k10D is on par with the Canon 30d in RAW performance.

The K10d got bad marks for its JPEG right out of the box. But no reasonable photographer would buy a feature rich camera like the pentax and use is as is. It can be tweaked a lot.

The Canon kit lenses, as they come with the Rebels, are, as I repeatedly read, garbage. You have to go to the next level of Canon lenses, which will make it expensive.

The Pentax kit lens is good, not the top, but good. Sharp. And you can use all Pentax lenses ever built for 35mm that are cheaply available on the market.

I myself own a Pentax K100d, and I am very happy with it. I have so many possibilities to tweak its performance, and the colors it gives are great.

Actually, there was a review in PC world, where the K100d clearly beat the Nikon D40, and, in color performance, even the Nikon D80.

So, I think the Pentax K10d is the greatest deal on the market today, a camera Pentax wants to get back on track after their not so good (and poorly named) *ist cameras.

The new Pentax generation is great. I like the solid design, quickly accessible menus, great performance. Like with all DSLRs the meter tends to overexpose, but not as much as the lower-end Nikons.

Also - if you go to Ken Rockwell's website kenrockwell.com, he repeatedly complains about the poor feature sets and displays on the Canons. Ken is a Nikon and Canon fan, and you can read all this in his Nikon D40 review.

(Canons have been known for poor ergonomic design and cheap plasticy feel - at least regarding the rebels, which also haven't been updated in a while).

So, check out the cameras, and buy what feels better for you.

Thanks for the info,
I'm really leaning towards the k10d,2nd would be the 30d.
My problem now is lenses, as you know there are loads for the Canon.
I'm frantically trying to find out if the Sigma 70 200 2.8 ex dg and/or other Tele-zooms work on the k10d with all the features of the lens still operational. Pentax don't have larger zooms. Its a steep learning curb!.
If there is the k10d is the one, if not the 30d.
Hopefully I purchase this coming week.
Any other suggestions would be great.
Thanks for the reply.

The Pentax I held felt better in my grip than my Canon 20D, and about on part with my Canon 5D. I'm not a big fan of the Rebels -- all that plastic. My first Canon dSLR was a Rebel and I've vowed not to repeat that mistake (had to have the cheapo plastic mirror assembly replaced after about 26,000 frames).

I can't speak to the image quality as I haven't had a chance to look at Pentax images in any detail. I'm toying with buying one next year as I've got a pile of extremely good glass lying around (I own a dozen or so K-1000s) that I wouldn't mind pressing into service again.

Depends on the lens. I still use the 18-55mm EF-S lens that came with my 300D on occasion. Yeh, the build quality is dodgy as hell, but the lens is optically superior and produces tack sharp images. You're just scared to touch the poor thing in case it falls apart.

My 17-85mm EF-S that came with my 20D has good build quality, for the most part, but the optics could be better. It's softer at the edges than it should be and the vignetting is awful at the wide end of the zoom (even after you stop down a bit).

I've since sworn off anything but L glass.



My Rebel definitely feels cheap. The 20D less so, but Canon screwed up in three major areas with the camera:

1. The battery grip has a habit of coming unfastened from the camera. I finally got so pissed off with this that I used denture adhesive to mount the grip -- it feels a lot more solid now.

2. The CF card door isn't integrated into the design properly and makes the grip feel cheap. It also squeaks when you squeeze the camera.

3. The mirror slap on this thing is so loud that it scares of wildlife at 500 meters. It sounds less like a camera and more or like a linebacker making a tackle. You'd think it would have been quiter than the 10D, not louder.

The 30D body has a better heft than the 20D, but you can still make the battery door squeak if you grip the camera enthusiastically. The shutter is quieter now and I'm told that the battery grip is not prone to falling off. You may want to have some denture adhesive handy if you buy a 30D just in case, however.

HTH

You got me laughing here... no smileys needed.

So you think those dpreview reviewers were incorrect when they said the rebel kit lens is not good?

This is fantastic: you can squeeze a Canon?

I am very satisfied with the quality of the K100d. It's simply amazing how much camera you get for 500$.

The camera also feels good, it has a solid, non-slippery surface which gives dust a hard time to cling to.

Regarding the kit lens, I grew up with fix focus lenses (Nikon) and had a strange feeling to buy a camera, which had a very non-expensive zoom lens on.

But zoom lenses got so much better than fix focus lenses used to be, and this kit lens is really good.

One notion to the focus assist lamp the Nikon D 40 has, and the Pentax hasn't: I like to shoot around and after sunset and haven't yet encountered a situation where the autofocus hasn't been able to lock focus.

It could be that their lenses had optical defects that mine does not. All I can tell you is that my 18-55 produces better looking images than my 17-85 does. I've sent the lens to Canon for service and they assure me that it is performing as expected (their expectations, not mine).



Let's just say that when you're gripping your camera with enthusiasm in an effort to avoid dropping it in the 12 inches or so of water that you're standing in, it's not uncommon to hear a squeak of protest from the 20D's CF card door.

Maybe the squeak is a feature for bady shots!
Squeeze and shoot

i think u can check out pentax's limited lenses. great optics/bokeh. great range of primes(limited) which focal lengths not offer in other lens maker/s.

Find a reasonably large zoom/ tele-zoom equal or above 200 say for a k10d? with all the lens functions working when bolted on?, if you know of any please tell. I would like all the functions to work.
Yours