Ira - A bit of follow-up on my post of a fortnight back... I've been following the posts since, and marvel at the prices over there....
And the incredibly cheap extended Warranties - $29.00 for 3 years extra Warranty - we can't get even 1 year extra for that, here.
The shop I buy my camera gear from - which has very polite and helpful staff, who'll take time to explain things and advise - tells me the reason for our prices is that we're a tiny market for the "big companies"....
Admittedly, there are only 22-million of us, and this tiny City of Sydney, at over 4.5-million, is larger than any US City apart from New York - but still a small market to those "big companies".
Possibly why Pentax isn't "company represented" here - Pentax gear (and Sigma gear) - is imported by a private company, C.R. Kennedy, which does have a very good and long-term reputation. Pentax and Sigma Warranties are therefore quite okay. (Quoting the shop's website, for Pentax, "...12 Months Warranty with CR Kennedy....")
However, if you want a Warranty Extension, it's $55.00 for 1 year, then $70.00, $85.00, and $99.00 for 2 to 4 years in that sequence.
While it might take months, I'm waiting for the K-R to be offered with the same kit-lenses as the K-X, including the Sigma 17-70mm. I already have a good used kit 18-55mm I bought cheaply on a local auction site, before I realised you can't buy a K-R "body only". (You can refuse the 18-55mm with the camera, but the price remains at $899.00 at present.)
So the "surplus" 18-55mm sits in the cupboard with the M42s and K-mounts I've been collecting... I have one of the old "kit" Sigma 100-300mm lenses (came with a bundle of gear I bought for $60.00 - nice many-pockets bag, an MZ-50, a Sigma 28-80mm, and the 100-300mm - all in apparently unused condition) - and if that Sigma IS actually "worse than a Coke-bottle" - my Canon SX10 and Fuji HS10 will just have to stand-in for the to-300mm and more, pot-shots...
I'm not paying flamin' $670.00 for an ED DA 55-300mm here... I could buy one for close to half that on the Forum here - or would be just as happy paying $300.00 or more, eventually, to get a good Tak or K-mount 300mm prime... I'm sure the friendly Tak folk here would advise on what to get, at the time...!
Partly because the Tak gear (and some of the K-mounts) - is so very good for the price - and partly because I
loathe being rorted and ripped off by the prices here...
Yes, I do know learning to use manual lenses on one's first DSLR will be quite an entertaining time - but I do have a Fuji HS10, and get reasonable results - also in RAW, using a tripod...
I bought the HS10, with twist-zoom and buttons all over for everything, feeling I didn't know enough yet to get a DSLR, so the Fuji would be an "interim learning experience". I now use the crankitatious thingy hand-held, full Manual and MF - because it's the "easiest" way to "tell it what to do"...
For some odd reason, Fuji doesn't charge Extra - or offer a Diploma - for such an Educational Device (just the $545.00 it cost in the first place) - and the Education has been quite successful - I am no longer scared of ANY darned DSLR - even if it's festooned with the most awkward set of Manual Lenses on the Planet....
Dave.