Originally posted by pinholecam K30 battery life is good enough.
It lasts about a day and a half of shooting in 'real world - tour type use'.
Spare batteries are dirt cheap on ebay.
Combine that with a 3rd party AA-holder and you are on pretty solid ground as far as batt life is concerned.
Coming from a K5 user who switched to K30.
The K30 is better for :
1. Response
2. AF accuracy
3. LV AF
4. Peaking
5. Seemingly a bit sharper o/p
6. Lighter
7. Cheaper
8. Color option (which is sometimes a conversation piece or taken less seriously by subject(a good thing))
Cons over a K5/II/IIs body :
1. Less buttons for fast access
2. No top lcd panel
3. 3 vs 5 exposure bracketing
4. No remote/timer release of bracketing
I can't agree with the battery thing! The K30 has the worst battery life from all of it's competitors. About 400-470 shots max is not enough. The other thing is that the battery itself is very slow for recharging... I have never seen that bad Li-ion performance before in any camera. If I want to use the camera seriously I must use AA batteries who make the camera a little heavier and less comfortable. About the other stuff... yes K30 can do everything that K5 can.
About movie performance - there is no pentax model to this moment who is good for movies. The quality of the movie is not good compared to the other brands and the controls are poor... every Sony NEX camera from the last models can shoot movie much better WITH PEEKING without any modifications. So... maybe in the future Pentax will make this better.