New Pentax Camera!

[miserere_mei]

<p>It's official now:</p>

<p>http://www.pentaximaging.com/digital-camera/X70/</p>

<p>Justin, ironically enough, this camera is in the "Compact Digital Camera" section of the Pentax website :-)</p>

[duane_mills]

<p>If this little gem had been around a year ago I wouldn't have bought my lovely wife an Olympus SP550UZ! The ergonomics on the X-70 look better and well...it's a Pentax!</p>

<p>Super zooms were the rage in the fall of 2007 and early 2008, but are they still hot now? Thoughts anyone....I happen to think it looks promising for a modest increase in market share....</p>

[andrewg_ny]

<p>A look at the specs suggests that the X70 may be a cousin to the Nikon P90 though I haven't seen any Kodaks yet that look like this. They don't appear to be twins though--the Pentax has CCD-shake SR rather than optical VR, and (probably to the detriment of the X70) only the Nikon has a tiltable review/compose rear LCD. Neither included a hotshoe, unfortunately. I am expecting that the camera firmware will be Pentax Optio-like in operation and probably different than what's in the Nikon. Both have also neglected to include RAW capture. (boo. This used to be more standard in more advanced compacts like Canon's S-series.)</p>

<p>I also noticed that Pentax has been labeling fewer of their compact camera lenses with "SMC". Not sure if that's because they're not using it, not making the lenses themselves, or what. Some of their better compacts (Optio A30, A40) still said SMC on the front of the camera.</p>

<p>Lets hope that Pentax sells enough of these to encourage them to stick with it. Pentax's somewhat limited retail presence makes me think that they may have a tough go at it, but I think they do sometimes sell compacts at places like Walmart.</p>

<p>By the way, for those who don't like the green button combined with the trashcan (think Oscar the Grouch), Optios have already have been like this for some time. The green button on the Optios is programmable and can behave either like a 'reset everything button' or bring up a customizeable Fn-like menu that can be operated with the four-way controller. On my A30 I have it set so that I can choose ISO, WB, Exp Comp, and drive mode (self-timer, etc). Fairly workable when you have a limited set of hard buttons; I prefer it vs. going straight to list-like menus. This X70 has a few more hard buttons including an e-dial and exposure comp so I expect it to be a good deal better than the Optio ergonomically.</p>

<p>Would I buy one? Who knows....maybe in several months when the street price drops below $275...I'll be interested to see how it reviews (or more likely how the Nikon reviews, since reviewers are more likely to review it).</p>