Originally posted by Verglace Have you actually seen the sample images? What makes you think that the sensors are less than their best or that you can't achieve the same results? From what I can see, the D600 suffers in having a slow max shutter speed (given this is a very bad thing) and max flash sync (however the max flash sync is still higher than Pentax's).
I have seen the sample images from the Imaging Resources site.
Noise:
Noise is better than the D7000 - possibly by a stop. However, as the D7000 has quite a bit of chroma noise ISO 6400 and up, and the D600 also has chroma noise, it's harder to compare with the k-5 (which lacks chroma noise).
Detail:
Does not surpass the k-5/D7000/D800 - as those sensors have higher pixel density than the D600, and since sensors don't outresolve lenses, the same lens on the D600 will resolve more detail, technically.
It's not a bad sensor - definitely better at noise than the D7000, and actually relatively comparable to the D800. Only thing is that it does have quite a bit of chroma noise at high ISOs - and my understanding is that chroma noise = bad, while luminance noise = ok.
@Norm - I don't think larger pixels = crisper image. Better noise performance, yes, but the higher the pixel density, the more it'll resolve.