Originally posted by Rondec Anyway, the T1i or T2i aren't the cameras that are flying off the shelf. They are the XSI, or whatever Canon's base camera is right now. The T2i sells for 800 ish dollars. The XSI sells for 500-ish and has 9 auto focus points, most of them fairly useless.
I had forgot the denomination - thanks for the reminder. The camera in my story was an Xsi or Xti - whatever Canon had around 5 years ago - I think this was actually before the T*i series even came out. Not an expensive model and that makes things worse, because the K10D and K-7 are higher end cameras than both X*i and T*i.
I think there are multiple issues there - size of AF points is one that affects AF-S too, but the lack of modern AF motors in most Pentax lenses is arguably an even bigger issue for AF-C. The screwdrive lenses just sound painful in AF-C mode and I never tried SDM ones after seeing all the complaints (and from what I read, they're not much faster either). I manually focus, so this is not important for me, but I can see why others might not pick Pentax because of this.
Originally posted by Rondec I don't know if you have ever shot one, but my experience is the center point one is the only one worth using and AF-C is lousy as well.
I only played a bit occasionally - never had any interest in Canon/Nikon DSLRs - I just don't like how they look and feel, especially after having used the K10D.
I told you one experience where I just saw someone else using their camera more effectively than I could coerce my Pentax K10D to behave - and they didn't use any fancy technique, just panning in automatic mode while shooting full burst. The rest is my experience testing the Pentax AF and it just doesn't seem reliable enough for mainstream use. Plus, on entry level cameras competing with X*i, like the K-x, it was challenging even for me to figure out where focus was achieved. Looking at the specs of the Canon equipment, I think that features like USM and focusing by wire give them an edge in that the AF motor needs to do less work and can do it perhaps a bit faster too; add the smaller AF points and better AF algorithms and you're getting a pretty good advantage. Kit lenses are perhaps better too. I played once with the long Nikon kit lens and it felt much more competent than my DA 50-200 - it was focusing more accurately and the results looked sharper too.
Hopefully, putting together the knowledge of Pentax to Ricoh will improve this area for future cameras. The low light performance of the K-5 II sounds good - I am not sure how that will translate to AF-C performance with screwdrive lenses though. But at this late stage, Ricoh needs some product to draw eyes away from other systems. They need to excel in an area that a larger segment of the market cares about. Other than a FF MILC, I am not sure what they can build to draw attention to their business - almost everything else is being offered already.