[shutterpuppy]

I like Frys too but it always seems by the time you get to their store, they are out of the item you want and try to convince you to buy something else (more expensive) Makes me wonder if they are running some sort of "bait n switch" operation.

Barry

[madbrain]

I have run into that with Fry's as well. Sometimes they advertise one item on sale and they don't have it at the store. There are a lot of Fry's stores in the SF bay area though, and usually one of them has it. But it requires more driving. I do like their return policy.

I played some more with the converter kit today, outdoors, in a park nearby. I'm still unimpressed with the wide angle converter. And that was the main reason I got the kit for. I still got some vignetting in many of my pictures with it, even though it didn't show in the viewfinder. I guess that's because of the 96% coverage of the K200D viewfinder only. I checked in the LCD afterwards and didn't notice it on the edges, but I guess I didn't look carefully enough.

I also got some blurriness in the edges, with or without the wide converter. It just gets much worse with the converter. It might be the camera settings I'm using. I was using auto most of the time.

On the other hand, the 2x zoom converter isn't as bad as I previously thought. It allowed me to get closer to some animals (squirrels). What I was seeing at home yesterday was barrel distortion when shooting my LCD. But I haven't seen it when shooting outdoors. I wasn't shooting quite as close.

The converters are 58mm and require a 52mm adapter to hookup to the lens. It came with it but it's still one extra part. Only one adapter came with the kit. It's harder to remove the adapter from one of the converters. I wish they came with 2 adapters. But anyway, since the wide converter is useless, maybe it's just as well. It's pretty painful to change adapters between shots. Now I understand why people spend $$$ on zoom lenses with bigger range ...

On the other hand, I'm very happy with the polarizer. I could never get a nice blue sky with my previous digicams. Now I can

[Airmide]

I went to Fry's Saturday and had a similar experience. Ours had some Pentax lenses but no bodies. The clueless employee actually tried to tell us that Pentax didn't exist anymore except lenses lol, like they had been sold and have a new name or something.

[shutterpuppy]

I went to Fry's Saturday and had a similar experience. Ours had some Pentax lenses but no bodies. The clueless employee actually tried to tell us that Pentax didn't exist anymore except lenses lol, like they had been sold and have a new name or something.

That's sad, I hate it when I know more about the product than the salesman. I've mentioned this before but it's worth repeating. Two years ago I ordered a Fuji s8000fd from fotoconnection.com ( Don't EVER order from them...ever!!) and they tried to sell me extra flat lithium batteries for it when it only takes AAs. I tried to explain it to them about "their" mistake and they insisted I was ordering the UK version of the camera and it didn't take AAs like the US version. So anytime I see a low price that's too good to be true online, I avoid that store like the plague. Right now there is a video on You Tube that advertises a K200D for $399. who is fooling who? Did it fall off a gravel truck? Amazon is about the only online retailer I trust with low prices.

Barry

[Airmide]

Well I'm even starting to wonder about Amazon. Did I already say that earlier? They were out of stock when I went to order it so I ordered from an Amazon partner, DBROTH. A couple days after I ordered, their website had gone *poof* and I googled them and found a ton of websites with people saying they ship gray market products and all sorts of other stuff.

I tried to cancel with Amazon and they told me I had to work directly with DBROTH. Which of course I didn't want to do after hearing about how they bully people who contact them, plus the only way was an email link through amazon. They said their A-Z guarentee would protect me if it was "not as advertised". But how would I ever be confident I would even KNOW if it was the right product??

Now I am planning to refuse, return to sender and dispute it with my bank. But it makes me angry that Amazon doesn't care at all who they do business with as a partner, and doesn't protect their customers from unreputable places. (I also noticed the address of DBROTH is in Brooklyn, surprise surprise).

I am waiting to buy directly through Amazon this time. I think I will open a new account so they don't try to give DBROTH my new credit card number or something.

[shutterpuppy]

Well I'm even starting to wonder about Amazon. Did I already say that earlier? They were out of stock when I went to order it so I ordered from an Amazon partner, DBROTH. A couple days after I ordered, their website had gone *poof* and I googled them and found a ton of websites with people saying they ship gray market products and all sorts of other stuff.

I tried to cancel with Amazon and they told me I had to work directly with DBROTH. Which of course I didn't want to do after hearing about how they bully people who contact them, plus the only way was an email link through amazon. They said their A-Z guarentee would protect me if it was "not as advertised". But how would I ever be confident I would even KNOW if it was the right product??

Now I am planning to refuse, return to sender and dispute it with my bank. But it makes me angry that Amazon doesn't care at all who they do business with as a partner, and doesn't protect their customers from unreputable places. (I also noticed the address of DBROTH is in Brooklyn, surprise surprise).

I am waiting to buy directly through Amazon this time. I think I will open a new account so they don't try to give DBROTH my new credit card number or something.

Armide,
Did DBROTH send you an e-mail asking you to call them to verify your order? I found out that's when the bells and whistles could ring of a scam, I almost found out too late, these scammers also want you (almost force) to buy extras you do not need or extended service contracts at at outrageous price. I almost fell into that trap but slammed down the phone before I could complete the deal.

[Airmide]

I wanted to mention something else here if there is anyone still looking to buy the k200d. Maybe I should start a new thread to make sure everyone sees it? I am in the process of ordering the body with lens kit from Amazon (directly) right now for $643.11, with free two day shipping!

It takes a little effort but I think I can explain. If anyone wants me to, just let me know.

Shutterpuppy:

No they didn't send me an email to confirm my order. In fact they didn't send me anything! I got the initial confirmation from amazon, and that's it. It said it was projected to ship by the 28th or 29th. By the 30th I hadn't heard anything at all so I started looking into it.

First I tried to see if I could find out anything through Amazon, and they didn't have any new information. Then I tried to contact DBROTH but their website doesn't exist anymore.

That's when I googled them and found all the reports of them being a scam. So I called Amazon to try to cancel my order. They said I had to contact DBROTH to cancel, though of course there was no way for me to do that other than try to email them, and after all the reports of people being bullied and stuff I didn't want to contact them directly anyway.

Especially since Amazon told me that if I cancelled the order after it was shipped, DBROTH had every right to charge me a 15% restocking fee (over $100) even if all I did was return to sender completely unopened!!

So I called my bank and they said to dispute the charges and return to sender. I spoke with two different customer service reps and they were both very sympathetic so I'm really hopeful that will work.

[madbrain]

Hi,

I wanted to mention something else here if there is anyone still looking to buy the k200d. Maybe I should start a new thread to make sure everyone sees it? I am in the process of ordering the body with lens kit from Amazon (directly) right now for $643.11, with free two day shipping!

It takes a little effort but I think I can explain. If anyone wants me to, just let me know.

As of right now Amazon only advertises $676.96 price before rebate. Where did you get $643.11 ?

[shutterpuppy]

Maybe this should be a stick note on here, it might be mentioned elsewhere on this forum but I'm too tired to look for it right now but check out Compare Prices, Store Reviews and Ratings by Real People

They are known for people like us buying items online and then rating the retailers and telling/sharing their experiences with them...good and bad.

Airmide, I didn't see DEBROTH when I entered a search for them so maybe you can be the first.

BTW, I got my first issue of Shutterbug magazine today and saw a two page (full color) ad for "Broadway Photo" one of the biggest scammers of them all, I would think and hope they would check their advertisers before allowing them to place ads.

Barry

[Airmide]

Yeah it's crazy all the scammers out there. The place I had trouble with was DBROTH not DeBroth. And I'm not sure how much trouble I actually had with them vs. just hearing about trouble other people had and having trouble getting out of it myself lol.

The $643.11 is if you are able to get it into your Gold Box picks, so it is an additional 5% off. It took me a couple of days of trying, but I think it was worth it. I always love getting the best deal possible.

I basically followed this: A step by step guide to order the Canon 40D {with kit lens} from Amazon's Gold Box Quick Picks for $1073.45 {no tax for most, and free shipping} YMMV - *************** Forums which gives instructions for another camera. For the k200d, I said "I own" the k200d battery grip and a k200d specific photography tutorial type book, and rated them both 5 stars (I'll go back and undo that so as not to skew the reviews as soon as my camera arrives).

Then I put the K200d in my cart overnight. I think I actually left it there two nights since I first opened the account late Sunday night. I also went through and marked "not interested" on all the stupid stuff under recommendations. I got rid of batteries and SD cards mostly, and left up the lenses, filters and stuff. I'm not sure if that made a difference.

The weird thing is I'm pretty sure I didn't see the k200d in my Gold Box this morning, but I did when I got home this afternoon.

There are more tips on that thread I linked an I might be able to answer more questions if anyone wants me to try.