Originally posted by Ash No, Ray.
The firmware upgrade was for focusing deficiencies, not to fix sharpness problems on the camera. Manually focusing you would still get sharp images. Don't confuse the two.
No confusion at all on my part. Can't speak for anyone else.
The
camera is more than the sensor, BTW, and the
camera did indeed produce soft images in many conditions where the competition had no trouble.
The reasons for K5 soft images are certainly many and varied, but for months, the AF issues resulted in soft images in certain conditions and the results had nothing to do with user error. The
camera was creating soft images in these conditions.
Having to resort to MF to get sharp images in very normal non-challenging conditions made the K5 less than competitive with cameras using the same sensor and costing the same or less (or even with older Pentax models, for that matter), and not useful at all in some shooting conditions. Having to spend more money on a focusing screen to MF the camera just to get good results just meant that the K5 did indeed produce soft images in normal use for the way that the majority of people use the camera.
The K5 would be worth about $5 without an AF system, IMO.
So, for many users, the K5 as designed and initially delivered, did indeed produce soft images in some conditions and user error had nothing to do with it. Nor was it any sort of myth, the camera produced the soft results by simply using it the way it was designed to be used.
Lastly, I do not recall seeing anyone claiming that the K5 produced
only soft images, just too many.
Ray