[djc737]

People evolve over time and come to different phases for most everything in their lives. Why should photography be any different. If you buy a K-5 and a bunch of primes and find switching lenses is not for you, they are sold and zooms are bought. You discover landscape photography is your passion and you have a Sherpa to lug your gear for you, you go full frame and buy a big body with big lenses. You discover that even the K-5 with small primes is too much for you, you go to micro FT and buy some very small zooms and primes.
Why someone sells out is as varied and the people selling. I sold my Canon Pro level film gear for a smaller setup with Olympus digital. Found it was still too big and tried micro FT and found it too small and did not like using an EVF, not saying it is good or bad but just how I like to shoot. Had a chance to go to B&H and picked up the K-5. Love at first hold. Bought some small primes and just am very happy, right size and right shape for me, right now.
Was tempted by the NEX but you either get big Sony lenses or my primes are all fully manual. The 5D Mark 3 and D800 are both big and heavy when compared to my K-5 even without adding the lenses. Right now I have the best APC sensor with the best output from it, till the K-01 arrives anyway. I have a set of beautiful primes that I do not mind changing at all. My photographic output has improved quite a bit using said setup as I see better. This has resulted in more interesting captures when out with the camera club. A prime shooter sees the world differently that a zoom shooter.
So I am quite happy with my K-5 at this time. If something changes that warrants a different system, I will change then. What everyone else does is kind of irrelevant to what I am doing now.

[StepOne]

Doesn't look like it! Why slam someone when you aren't sure? Seriously.

For what its worth I went and checked all of his posts to the forum and he sold his lenses here but not the K-5 unless he did it under another account.

My bad, post deleted. Still the post sound like "there was something wrong with my camera so i sold it to someone else".

[Docrwm]

My bad, post deleted. Still the post sound like "there was something wrong with my camera so i sold it to someone else".

But he could have revealed his reason to the person. I know many that never use the hotshoe. Anyway, I deleted my response since your original post is gone.

[bossa]

Smilesy, I just got a K-5 here in Australia with full CR Kennedy covered Warrenty and extended 3yrs plus an extra battery for 1235.00, as well as a two week lemon clause for direct instore swap if anything went wrong. By the time you get a grey for 950 then delivery and no Australian warrenty its not a great deal more to buy here for the security of having an Australian warrenty.

As to so many selling only they can truely answer, I think you'll find very few making the big swap to a FF system.

You don't need a lemon clause. In Australia you have 12 months in which to return something which is clearly not what you wanted or does not really function the way it was advertised to. You could walk into the store from which you bought the thing after 10 months and demand your money back and there's little they can do about it.

[jlstrawman]

I sold my K-5 in order to try Micro 4/3. I have been pleasantly surprised with the quality images from my Panasonic GH2. I can still use my great
Pentax, Sigma, and Tamron lenses via an inexpensive adapter. Photography is a hobby for me, to be enjoyed.

[SpecialK]

You don't need a lemon clause. In Australia you have 12 months in which to return something which is clearly not what you wanted or does not really function the way it was advertised to. You could walk into the store from which you bought the thing after 10 months and demand your money back and there's little they can do about it.

Nice rental system you have there. I hope it still requires some documentation of a true flaw.

[normhead]

jsherman, hey, maybe you should write to the guys at DxO. I'm sure your laughter will convince them to rate the D700 sensor higher than the K-5s. Maybe they can change their weighting formula so the D700 comes out on top. Right now it doesn't and even second hand on kijiji it's still twice the price of a new K-5 or close to it.

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Last edited by normhead; 03-02-2012 at 07:30 AM.

[jsherman999]

jsherman, hey, maybe you should write to the guys at DxO. I'm sure your laughter will convince them to rate the D700 sensor higher than the K-5s. Maybe they can change their weighting formula so the D700 comes out on top. Right now it doesn't and even second hand on kijiji it's still twice the price of a new K-5 or close to it.

Norm, correct me if I'm wrong, but didn't you recently rail against using charts, numbers and technical ratings to judge IQ?

At any rate, k-5 is a truly great camera for most purposes, and the sensor has very good QE, good DR response at base ISO, and is very good up to about Iso 1600 and very usable to Iso 3200 - and the price is right. I'm not going to get into a sensor size or body performance discussion because it's been discussed ad naseum, but it you buy your camera based on DxO sensor scores alone, you're not doing yourself a favor. (and you'd better get ready to sell everything and buy one of the upcoming sony mirrorless cams!)

Really, if you want to use DxO, you should look at one of the sub scores in an area of photography that concerns you, and even if you're concerned about DR, you may want to consider DR beyond base iso, unless that's all you shoot in.

[deadwolfbones]

D700's sensor is no doubt better than the K-5's.

Not by much, but having extensively used both side by side, I'd love to put the D700 sensor in the K-5 if I could.

edit: and as for the camera as a whole, it's well worth its asking price.

[normhead]

Really, if you want to use DxO, you should look at one of the sub scores in an area of photography that concerns you, and even if you're concerned about DR, you may want to consider DR beyond base iso, unless that's all you shoot in.

You assume I didn't, wrongly I might ad, the sub scores for the K-5 is better for Dynamic Range (Landscape) and Portrait (Colour depth.) The D700 is better for low light (sports), and those are not going ot be your best images on any system anyway. IN reality they are about the same in their ratings in terms of probable IQ, so if you'd like I'll revise my statement to "why would you pay twice as much for the same IQ and lower pixel count.?" Is that better? Hey if anyone wants to show me a side by side of a couple of landscapes showing me the D700 is in some way superior, I'm game. Until some one can do that, I'm going with the K-5 and saving $1000.

[IIGQ4U]

My bad, post deleted. Still the post sound like "there was something wrong with my camera so i sold it to someone else".

Were you replying to my post? I'd really like to read what you said.

I didn't sell my K-5 here, nor did I sell all of my lenses on this site. I owned my K-5 for all of three months and fully disclosed the issue I had with the buyer. Additionally, my K-5 was under warranty with a few thousand actuations, so my buyer had absolutely no reason to be concerned.

The K-5 other than this was great!

[ataunton]

IN reality they are about the same in their ratings in terms of probable IQ, so if you'd like I'll revise my statement to "why would you pay twice as much for the same IQ and lower pixel count.?"

This is what it came down to for me. I just recently picked up a K-5 after initially considering a D300s or D700. I was flip flopping back and forth on the two Nikons for quite sometime trying to decide if the extra expense was worth it to me. After reading a review on the K-5 at Steve Huffs website and DP Review I decided to check the local CL. Found one that was just over a month old with the kit lens for a great deal and decided to check it out. Very glad I did, I have been very impressed with this camera so far. In the end I couldn't justify the price of the D700 especially with very high used prices. My current needs also don't really call for such an expensive piece of kit. I guess the high number of FS K-5's worked out rather well for me.

[IIGQ4U]

People tend to place too much significance on megapixels. The D700's larger pixel size allows it to have great dynamic range and signal to noise ratio.

In my experience, everything on the D700 just works. Very fast and accurate auto focus, AF tracking is quite good as well. Additionally, their CLS system is a joy to use and is a very capable and powerful system for triggering off camera Nikon flashes. I also enjoy the expanded field of view and overall selection of extremely high quality lenses.

The Pentax menus are far superior to Nikon's, their weather sealing is second to none and the shutter sound on the K-5 is extremely smooth unlike the Nikon (D700) which is extremely loud and mimics the sound of a machine gun.

I am really looking forward to more high quality lenses from Pentax as well as a full frame offering to round out their stable of high quality cameras. I look forward to returning to Penax in the future.

[deadwolfbones]

People tend to place too much significance on megapixels. The D700's larger pixel size allows it to have great dynamic range and signal to noise ratio.

In my experience, everything on the D700 just works. Very fast and accurate auto focus. AF tracking is quite good as well. Additionally, their CLS system is a joy to use and is a very capable and powerful system for triggering off camera Nikon flashes. I also enjoy the expanded field of view and overall selection of extremely high quality lenses.

The Pentax menus are far superior to Nikon's, their weather sealing is second to none and the shutter sound on the K-5 is extremely smooth unlike the Nikon's which is extremely loud and mimics the sound of a machine gun.

I am really looking forward to more high quality lenses from Pentax as well as a full frame offering to round out their stable of high quality cameras. I look forward to returning to Penax in the future.

Wholly accurate post, iMO.

[normhead]

People tend to place too much significance on megapixels. The D700's larger pixel size allows it to have great dynamic range and signal to noise ratio

I'd love to see couple of sample images that would demonstrate that. The problem I have with this kind of info is, you can do the math, and theoretically you're right.. but without real world testing it's just a statement. A statement that assumes the same sensitivity to photons, if the smaller sensor actually has higher sensitivity to photons then it may in fact have less signal to noise ratio, if one is a backlit sensor, then it may have higher signal to noise ratio , filters can have an effect, the processing engines can have an effect, so ya, that's the theory. But do your science guys, without experimental evidence to back it up, no theory is worth a lot. The proof of a theory is it's supported experimentally. Until it's supported by empirical proof it's just a theory. There is just way to much stuff said on here that is theoretical. I can understand statements like the above based on the handling characteristics of the camera, how the camera feel in your hand,

I was thinking on my walk today... go down to Henry's when my tax return comes in, take some images, process them on my computer, do the pixel peeping and get it over with. It might cost me a couple days of my life but it would answer for me what the difference in IQ and let me do my own comparison. As much as everyone says you can't go by DxO ratings, they did have everyone of these cameras in their hands, and came up with a rating system that says something, even if we're not quite sure what it is it shows. If there are problems with going with DxO numbers, there is even more of a problem with going with anecdotal evidence including accommodating for differences in shooting style and subject.

To me, looking at comparative images is a first order comparison, DxO is second, anecdotal evidence is third. People say they like their D700's better than they like their K-5's, I haven't seen anyone post something different, and some who've had both say they get better images from the D700. Is that worth more or less than DxO's rating... I don't know. To me they are both evidence but not conclusive evidence, and it would take more time than I'm willing to take to explain why. jsherman post a 5 year old link testing 2 Canon products, one FF one APS-c suggesting that FF is better, marginally, very marginally. In fact from that test, my conclusion was FF was not worth the money. Other opinions may differ. Now we're talking a whole new generation of sensors and about to move to another. I just can't go with that 5 year old data, and apply it cross brand. I'm not sure how you apply a Canon FF and Canon APS-c to say a Nikon FF is better than a Pentax APS-c. To the analytical mind, that is simply not a supportable position.