Originally posted by Ron Boggs Whether or not Pentax cares about the opinions of N. American and European photogs is probably not public info. They sure don't appear to give a rip or factor in such opinions. Their complete avoidance of "spec war" games with the big 2 would suggest that the "spec war" parlance of the Western Hemisphere is not a major concern to them.
Au contraire
, the opinions of the European market are of great interest to them (France has the highest market share of Pentax in the world) and I assume North America too. The K10 and K20 are not Japanese focused products.
If anything I would say Canon and Sony focus almost entirely on the US market for the top end, and the Asian market at the bottom end, and so alienate many Europeans.
Quote: In defense of Pentax...they did win the megapixel war for a few months with the K20D. But that seemed more of a safety harness tying them tightly to Samsung more so than an attempt to one-up the competition--note the lack of marketing referencing the megapixel issue.
If you look at the priorities of the K20D and the K10D and compare the specification of the bodies (the various compromises) its obvious to see where Pentax concentrate their efforts compared to Canon and Nikon.
Quote: And once again, does it matter if Pentax goes under? How will it effect you? I own an FA*600 and FA*250-600, plus several other FA* and Ltd. lenses--I'm in really deep--as in several tens of thousands of dollars deep.
Me too. But I suspect if they disappear, the K mount will not. The installed base and all the associated patents are too valuable to someone. Its worth noting that since AF became normal, not one major lens mount has disappeared and a new one (4/3) appeared.
Quote: My presumption is if they disappear, my cost for used bodies to pair with my lenses will go down considerably. But the lenses will still work fine. On the other hand collector value could go up. So either my lenses gain in value and I can cash in to switch brands if desired...or the cost of continued use goes down as bodies are dumped on the market. I'm not sure how I see myself losing out in either scenario. Future whiz-bang developments from other companies? I say so what. I don't even use autofocus and the pixel counts are plenty high for my current uses for DSLR bodies. Even JPEGs from a K10D converted to TIFFs produce more than the file size the magazines I sell to want for up to 2 page spreads. RAW goes way beyond what's needed for mags. So given present knowledge (what little I really do know) I just don't see a problem even if the worst case scenario were to happen. And as an optimist, I don't expect anything untoward to happen. It will all be fine. Just wish more of my images were as fine!
Well thats something you DO have control over