| To buy or not to buy (and sell the K-7)?
Hello everyone,
I'm a little torn over a matter, so I'm writing here to seek counsel. I'm sure there's gonna be a few of you who have "been there, done that", which hopefully will help me to make up my mind.
Backstory: I've used a *ist D for 6 years before taking the plunge on the K-7 in February 2010. I wasn't planning on replacing the D, as it's still working flawlessly, but I was in NY at the time and, as they say, "opportunity makes a thief", or in this case makes me a weak consumer... So, anyway, I bought it, and I gotta say I'm quite pleased with it, weather sealing and overall speed (and ok, resolution too) being a vast improvement over my oldie.
On a seemingly unrelated note, another thing that happened this year is, I've been shooting out of my comfort zone (concerts), mostly exploring this new playground that is the studio. I've soon found out that the K-7 excels at that, and my 77mm Limited finally seems happy, too.
The thing is, being on a concerts drought, I haven't been able to put the K-7 to test in these conditions (low light, harsh/difficult lighting, colour casts and — gasps — glowing reds, which my old D didn't appreciate much), but one thing I know is that the 7 is less than stellar at higher ISOs, which makes me a little afraid to even try. In fact, there's finally a big(-gish) concert coming up at the end of January and I absolutely have no idea if the 7 is gonna hold up and deliver.
Backstory ends here.
Now on to my actual point.
In spite (or maybe because of) the recent stain talk of the K-5, I'm actually evaluating its purchase. Maybe, had it been problem-free, I'd have it already, whereas now I'm debating whether I should buy now, wait for stain problems to settle, or skip it altogether — because other than my own paranoia, the 7 is perfectly fine. To complicate matters, Pentax here is offering a ~140$ cashback on the 5, but only until December 31, and I've been able to find somewhat decent prices over the interwebs (from local retailers, so cashback and warranty should be legit and hassle-free, respectively).
As you might have noticed, it took me 3 generations of cameras before caving in the first time around, so even thinking about buying a new camera when the other one isn't even a year old feels a little weird to me. On the other hand, I might be able to do more concerts next year, and the main reason for this impulse-replacement would be down to better high ISO performance and DR. On top of that, a friend of mine is in the market for a camera, and might be interested in buying my K-7, should I decide to sell it. Since it's still virtually new, I might be able to make enough money to get me a new K-5 with 400$ on top of my K-7 price (only with cashback, though).
Decisions, decisions... what would you do?
Is K-5's ISO performance and DR worth the switch?
Is K-7's high ISO bashing unjustified? (Or, am I doing it wrong?)
Should I take advantage of the cashback offering from Pentax? Wait until K-5's sensor is spotless? Wait until its price drops without resorting to cashbacks? Keep the K-7 and quit whining?
Has anybody else made the same switch? Any regrets?
I hope you can talk me out of (or into) it so that I can finally put my mind at ease...
Thanks,
Sabine
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