I upgraded from a K100D Super to a K-r, and Im having nothing but probelms when it comes to flashes.
I have a dedicated p-TTL Vivitar 383. This flash worked fine with my old K100D Super. I have had a ton of other problems with this flash and my K-r as discussed towards the end of this post:
https://www.pentaxforums.com/forums/pentax-k-r-forum/137599-vivitar-flash-kr-...ml#post1482100 .
But now I'm finding that not only does it not work properlly on camera, it doesn't work in slave mode either. It gets triggered by the preflash, and by the time the camera shutter opens the flash light is gone. This never happened with K100D, I wonder if that camera didn't have a preflash? My camera is in M mode, so I'm not sure why I even need a preflash to measure exposure to begin with. Is there any way to disable?
The strange thing is that if I set my flash to anything below 1/2 power, it actually does sync. But 1/1 and 1/2 don't sync. It seems like it would be the opposite. I'd think the stronger power would have more light lingering even if it's late. At first I thought it was a low battery issue. I put in some fresh batteries and everything worked fine. But then I realized that it was set at a lower power. So when I bumped it back to full power, it didn't work again.
I'm looking for a new flash now, but I don't trust that any other one (besides the Pentax flashes $$$) will do any better. Makes it hard to shop. I don't trust the p-TTL "standard" anymore, since my p-TTL Vivitar flash doesn't work with the newer K-r (or K-5) p-TTL systems (according to Pentax and Vivitar support).
Any suggestions? I'm looking for something that...
Can handle preflash for slave
Has manual power adjustment
Has bounce/swivel
Preferably has rear curtain
I don't even care if I have p-TTL this time (I used manual more often), but if I do, it needs to actually be compatible with the new Kr/K5 style p-TTL
Looking for something under $150