Summary
I was all geared up to go for the big name “Nikon” and buy their entry level model D40. Thanks to my lucky stars I came across the Pentax K100D and, after a lot of research and deliberation, I changed my mind. I could not be happier. The K100D is an absolute joy to use and continues to reward me with its features and image quality.
It is the ideal camera for people interested in serious photography without the budget to enter the professional league of much more expensive cameras. With its backward compatibility to the classic Pentax K-mount it gives you (image stabilised!) access to a vast range of legendary and very affordable lenses. Paying a lot of attention to detail, the designers created a product that provides excellent support for creating high quality images (see “Strengths” below).
If your main focus is action photography, the K100D is not the best choice since there are other models with faster autofocus and a quicker burst rate during continues shooting.
See below for a detailed list of pros and cons. If you are looking for a detailed product description, this review is quite comprehensive:
Steves Digicams - Pentax K100D Digital SLR - User Review. Here
Pentax K100D Digital Camera - Full Review - The Imaging Resource! you can read how a real photographer gets excited about the K100D. I wrote a
“Tips and Tricks” article for the K100D.
I love this camera. Many features demonstrate that it was made for true photographers. Ultimately, your needs determine which camera is best for you. While I certainly found a number of issues to mention in the “Weaknesses” and “Wishlist” section, the plus points mentioned in the “Strengths” sum up to an unbelievably nice package which is unbeatable if the few shortcomings don’t affect you. Thanks Pentax, for this outstanding value for money.
BTW, almost all of the comments made here also apply to the K100D super, which adds automatic sensor cleaning and support for modern lenses with ultra-sonic autofocus motors.
Strengths
The K100D has many points in its favour:
In-Body Shake Reduction
When switched on, shake reduction moves the sensor in all directions to compensate any small camera movements caused by inevitable hand shaking. This allows you to use longer exposure times before images become blurred. Often this means either getting the shot or not because the available light is just to low for a faster shutter speed. Of course, like any image stabilisation, this system can only avoid blurring caused by camera movement. Fast moving objects still require fast shutter speeds (unless you are panning). The built-in shake reduction means that any K-mount (or M42 mount with an adapter) lens ever made will suddenly be a “VR” lens (as Nikon calls their image stabilised lenses). Hence, you don’t have to put up with lenses that do not support image stabilisation and are not forced to pay for image stabilisation afresh for each and every new lens you buy.
Sensitive Sensor
At first sight the 6 MP sensor seems to be outdated by today’s 10MP or higher resolution sensors. A 10MP sensor just gives you ~1.3 x better resolution in each dimension, in other words, not much more. Having more MP allows for more cropping potential, which is good, but if you can frame the image in camera, 6MP can go a long way to provide you with satisfying prints (up to A3 = 11.69 x 16.54 inches).
Low Light Specialist
In combination, the shake reduction and the sensitive (SONY) sensor provide you with a camera that will fare well in low light situation were others will already give you blurred images or images with a lot of noise. This also means that you will be able to use some lenses comfortably, that are too slow (dark) for many other cameras. For instance the Tamron 18-250mm f/3.5-6.3 Di II Macro (was also available as a Pentax badged version) is an incredibly versatile lens with surprising image quality. One of its few disadvantages is that it is not very fast, in particular at the telephoto end. No problem with the K100D. The combination pleases me no end and is ridiculously affordable.
Hands-Off Approach to Noise Reduction
The K100D produces less noise than higher MP cameras to start with but I particularly appreciate Pentax’s “hands-off” approach to noise reduction. Yes, the D40 spits out images which have less noise but at the expense of little detail left. Check out
Nikon D40 Review: 17. Photographic tests to see for yourself which kind of image you prefer; the clean but smeared D40 version or the more detailed K100D version with a bit of (almost film like) grain.
Built-In Focus Motor
The K100D’s built-in autofocus motor will drive any K-mount autofocus lens, no matter how old it is. In comparison, Nikon’s entry level models can only autofocus with a few modern lenses which have their own autofocus motor built in. Although the latter system provides you with very quiet and quick autofocus and the respective number of lenses is growing, this means that on a Nikon many classic, very affordable old lenses will only support manual focus.
AA powered
Four AA batteries or accumulators power the K100D. While these are slightly heavier than a specialised accumulator, they liberate you from special manufacturer’s accumulators and chargers. Four 2500 mAh accumulator will give you around 500-600 shots, which is plenty, AFAIC. You can buy a couple of sets for a very affordable price. If you ever run out of power, four simple AA batteries from any odd shop will save the day.
Build-quality
Handling the K100D is a joy as it is very sturdy and instils a feeling of quality. While the body is not as big and heavy as a professional DSLR, it still provides an excellent grip for bigger hands. If you are a lady with small hands and/or looking for the smallest form factor possible, you may prefer the D40 or a Canon Rebel model. I find these way too small to hold comfortably. Note that the new Pentax K-7 has almost the size of the K100D (the latter is a tiny bit smaller). I love the fact that the door to the USB connector is solid and spring-loaded. No fumbling with a cheapo rubber cover you’ll find on point&shoots or the D40. I enjoy the simple operation and the apparent attention to detail by the designers when I operate the door. Every single time.
LCD Display on Top
Just like a pro camera, the K100D features an LCD display at the top, showing important shooting data. On a Nikon D40 you’ll have to waste battery power to use the preview LCD and waste time by turning the camera to look at it. Details like these make me feel that the compromises made with the K100D were made in the right way.
11-Auto Focus Sensors
Nine of these are of the more useful and more expensive cross-type (sensing focus both vertically and horizontally). For comparison, the Nikon D40 gives you three, with only one of them being a cross-type. The sensors can be selected manually and are placed very well, i.e., close to “rule of thirds” positions. Not being forced to focus with one sensor and then recompose is great for action shots where you want to position something (say a player) somewhere other than the centre and don’t have time to recompose. Also, for small DOF shots, (say portrait or macro) recomposition is often not viable as the change in camera position/angle will move the subject out of focus.
Conservative Exposure
The K100D will expose cautiously, i.e., will rather underexpose rather than overexpose, if in doubt. This is ideal for a digital camera since there is no way to rescue blown highlights. With a slightly underexposed shot, you always stand a good chance to recover a lot of shadow details with some mild post-processing. Inexplicably, the D40 will typically overexpose. I know a D40 user, who applies a constant -0.7 EV exposure compensation to counteract this behaviour.
Miscellaneous Goodies
There is a mirror lock up shooting mode, which allows you to reduce camera vibrations to an absolute minimum. This function is cleverly linked with the self-timer option which helps to keep the user interface small.
You can manually set the white balance with a spot metering mode. I once shot a theatre performance and used the programme someone held six rows in front of me as a white balance reference. Thanks.
Two features you won’t find on a D40 are:
- Auto-bracketing: Make a series of images with varying exposure levels.
Great for nailing the exposure and/or creating the increasingly popular HDR images.
- Optical preview: Stop-down the lens for an optical preview of the depth-of-field for a given aperture. This is available in addition to a digital preview functionality.
Decent Kit-Lens
The kit lens, of course, does not compare to high grade expensive lenses, but it has very decent quality. The results you get with kit lenses from the Canon 450D or the Olympus E-520 are appalling in comparison. The Nikon D40 kit lens has no dedicated focus ring and you are forced to manually focus with a wobbly barrel. That’s no match to the otherwise very capable body (which uses the same SONY sensor as the K100D).
Bundled Software
The “PhotoLaboratory” offers top-of-the-class RAW conversion (SILKYPIX engine) and supports lens distortion/vignetting/chromatic aberration corrections.
Beautiful Images
I compared a lot of sample images and found the K100D images to be consistently more appealing than that of the D40 or other models. The colours are very accurately reproduced and the exposure retains more details in bright areas. I feel the pictures resemble those made on analogue film with a 3D feeling and warmth, compared to a rather technical, slightly sterile touch of the D40 images.
Weaknesses Not a Speed-King
If your emphasis is on action, look elsewhere. The K100D’s continues shooting mode is relatively slow (2.8 frames per second) and does not last very long (5 frames, after which the rate slows down). In particular, if you are shooting RAW, this will slow you down when it counts to get in as many shots as possible in a short interval. Also, while the K100D’s auto-focus is more than adequately fast in normal circumstances, for action shoots you may prefer a Canon 40D or Nikon D300.
Note when some people call Pentax autofocus “slow”, this is relative to other DSLR models and means “very, very quick” compared to point&shoot models. Autofocus speed varies from almost instant, over 0.2 seconds to almost a second, depending on the lens, what focus range needs to be covered, and light availability. With low light (when flash or really long exposures are required) the autofocus can sometimes go hunting but at least it tries to lock where others give up. With my Tamron 18-250mm f/3.5-6.3 Di II Macro, autofocus is quick and spot on target.
Lack of SDM Lens Support
Unlike the K100D super, the K100D does not drive the modern (silent and ultra-quick) ultra-sonic motor autofocus lenses. Yet the K100D super does not allow
fine tuning of the AF system) as the K100D does.
Exposure Correction kills Auto-ISO
The very useful “Auto-ISO” mode, in which the camera automatically determines the optimal ISO speed, is disabled when you apply an exposure correction. Unless you are happy with ISO 200, you then need to choose the ISO mode manually again. BTW, it would be nice to have a way of permanently displaying the current ISO setting.
Automatic White Balance Challenged with Incandescent Light
The automatic white balance works excellently most of the time, but incandescent/tungsten light is outside its working range. That means that you need to remember to manually set white balance to the "Tungsten" setting if you shoot indoors with warm artificial light. The K100D, however, is not the only DSLR with this behaviour. It shares it with many other DSLR models. At least its incandescent preset white balance performs better than most.
Slow Flash Synch Speed
The maximum flash sync speed is just 1/180 (this is a limitation the K100D shares with all Pentax DSLRs). You may want to have a faster synchronisation when doing flash fill-in in the presence of bright sunlight. I personally have never missed a faster synchronisation.
No RAW+JPEG mode
You are forced to either shoot RAW or JPEG, you cannot shot both at the same time. No big deal AFAIC, and the D40’s combined mode is useless as it only provides you with a JPEG in “basic” quality.
No Backlight for Top LCD Display
This means you cannot read the top LCD in very low light situations without a flashlight. However, this is way better than having no display at all.
No Flashy Menus
This isn’t a real weakness. Some menu items are abbreviated and there are no flash graphics, like featured on the D40. However, if this is of any significance to you, ask yourself what the real purpose of a camera is and whether you are after a photographer's tool or a toy to play with. I love the fact that you can navigate upwards even at the top of menus to directly reach bottom menu items. Also, the dial supports a quick change between menus.
Wishlist
There are a number of improvements I can imagine but take these with a grain of salt as they certainly exceed the expectations one should have towards an entry-level priced camera and equally apply to the competition.
It’ll be nice to have a default button that resets all shooting settings to a user-defined default. Apparently, this is what the “green” button does on other Pentax models. With the K100D you need to get used to check whether you have made any specific settings, e.g., exposure compensation, previously and make sure you don’t inadvertently use it on the next shot.
The auto selection of focus points should go into manual mode, when the user uses the cursor keys. Pressing OK could bring it back to automatic.
The P-mode could switch to Tv or Av, depending on which value your are manually manipulating. I believe his is called the “hyper-manual” mode on the K20D for example.
Some user settings (e.g., bright vs natural image ton) should be retained for auto modes. Since many auto modes automatically choose “bright” or apply heavier sharpening, I don’t use them at all. Sometimes it could be convenient to use a P-mode that optimises for shutter speed when shooting actions scenes.
When the camera shows a preview of the last shot taken, it would be nice if one could immediately zoom into it instead of switching to “play” mode first. Luckily, later Pentax cameras have this feature.
The Pentax Laboratory uses a lot of screen real estate but is otherwise excellent. It is a shame that it only opens RAW files, as I would like to be able to use its lens correction and curve control facilities for JPEGS as well. Inexplicably to me one has to enter the angle of view of the lens manually, while it should be possible to extract this information from the EXIF data.
The manual is OK, but could sometimes be more explanatory. Often you get descriptions along the lines of “Use the ISO choice menu to chose the desired ISO setting” without further explanation of what that implies on a technical level and when you should go for which setting. Granted, the manual is not supposed to be a beginner’s photography guide but a little more information wouldn’t hurt.
The KAF mount is “crippled” in the sense that it lacks a mechanical coupler for the aperture setting of older manual lenses (again a limitation the K100D shares with all Pentax DSRLs). These lenses are still usable as the K100D supports them with a corresponding setting, but automatic exposure then requires one additional press of a button for each shot. It would have been lovely to just choose the aperture on the lens manually and shoot. This is the only example, I am aware of, where cost cutting got in the way of supporting a true photographer’s need.
There could be more dedicated buttons on the body for white balance, ISO, focus mode setting, but you won’t find these on a D40 either. The Sony A200 was the only entry level model I know of which deviates from the “beginner friendly” minimal button interface. The Pentax solution with a “Function” button that directly takes to the four most frequently used settings is very useful in practise, though.
who say that this camera is 'too' slow for "sports and certain wildlife applications" [I do note the qualification in 'your' statement, though - it's all relative, as you said].
; and I don't intend to find out
]! I know that there are DSLRs that are quite a bit faster [relatively-speaking]; but how did sports photographers get their shots, 40, 50 or 60 years ago
?
Linear Mode
