Pentax KX vs K1000

[bebu_lamar]

<p>I have the Pentax KX in good working condition but someone told me that for $30 I can upgrade to the K1000. How much better is the K1000 compared to my KX? Am I missing anything for not upgrading to the K1000? Any comment will be greatly appreciated.</p>

[jerry thirsty]

<p>It's not. The KX is a better featured camera than the K1000.</p>

<p>http://www.bdimitrov.de/kmp/bodies/film_K/index.html</p>

[lachaine]

<p>Very similar, but, as I recall, the K1000 was a little more basic - as it was the logical successor to the SP1000, itself the more basic version of the Spotmatic. It doesn't have a self-timer or depth-of-field preview. The KX had those. The K1000 was in production a lot longer though, so there are much newer ones out there than KX's.</p>

[jeff_drew4]

<p>If you can get a spiffy K1000 for $30 then adding the second basic body is not a bad idea.:-)</p>

[bebu_lamar]

<p>I think the guy was BSing me, so I think I rather check with you guys. No he wanted my KX and $30 not just $30 for the K1000. Thanks all for the help.</p>

[Mike Gammill]

<p>The only advantage of the K1000 that I can see is since it was made for many years after the KX, it won't be as old, but trade "up" for $30, no. The K1000 has really gone up in value so much that it often fetches a high price. If your KX is working well then why trade? Now, if the seller offered you a clean MX for $30, that would be a different matter.</p>

[donnie_strickland]

<p>If he wanted your KX <strong><em>and </em></strong>$30, he was trying to scam you. The KX has more features than a K1000:</p>

<p>--Mirror lockup<br>

--DOF preview<br>

--self timer<br>

--the ability to turn the meter off by use of the wind lever</p>

<p>Of course this is assuming your KX is in good working condition.</p>

[steven_bristow]

<p>I sold my K1000 after I bought a KX. The KX is a much better camera.</p>

[enric]

<p>I bought a K1000 specially because it was the most basic model I could find as I was fearing that there would be no replacement batteries any more for the more automated models. Well that latter is not true, but the K1000 is a fine sturdy camera. I don't use it because I finally managed to get a Spotmatic-F which is a real pleasure.</p>

[john_tran14]

<p>Bebu:<br>

It depends on you. If you want a simpler display in the viewfinder, go for the K1000. That is what the new students want. In the K1000 viewfinder you can always see if the exposure would be over, under or right on the money. You dont have to remember for example, what is the difference between the black and the green pins, should the green or the black pin is higher related to over or under exposure.</p>

<p>With the simpler K1000, you will concentrate only on shutter speed, aperture and ISO settings which are the basic things that a new student needs to learn. Of course if you are a more advanced user, you will see that the K1000 is missing many things. For example, it doesn't have matrix metering with more than 1000 sensors, and it doesn't have CLS flash automatic TTL system. But for a beginner, the less is better and you can learn metered manual mode and how to use manual flash</p>

<p>Now I agree the guy seems to scam you, but if you are a beginner, you'd better off with a K1000, so my suggestion is go get a K1000 and keep your KX for later or alternatively, you could later move on to the digital K-x.</p>

[john_smullen]

<p>In my experience the biggest single advantage of the KX over the K1000 is the full information viewfinder. Having shutter speed, aperture and an intuitive match neddle meter in the viewfinder made picture taking a joy. And to my eyes it appeared to be slightly brighter.</p>

[john_tran14]

<p>I, as many others here, like the more information in the display of the KX in the viewfinder, so we dont have to remove our eye from the viewfinder to see our settings. That would make our actions faster. However, for a beginning student, it's perfectly ok to take time checking and adjusting settings and it's very important to be simple and easy to understand. Besides, I have never heard anybody complaining that the viewfinder display of the OM1 is so poor (exactly like the K1000), nothing but a meter pin.</p>

<p>The logics of the K1000 is very simple: you adjust the settings and the meter tell you that is over or under expose. With the KX, first of all we have to remember which pin is for the meter and which pin is our setting (honestly, right now I cant remember it's the black or the green pin). Then we have to "understand" that if the speed pointed by the meter pin is smaller (resp. larger) we will have under expose (resp. overexpose). We call that the recommended shutter speed. But the camera doesn't really recommend that shutter speed because maybe we would adjust the aperture instead. It's even weirder to remember this "we can adjust the aperture until the recommended speed equals the speed we set". In other words, we dont follow what the meter recommends but we adjust the camera until it recommends us exactly what we want to do in the first place!!! Dont you think that is confusing? for a beginner?</p>

[John Smullen]

<p>I acquired my KX in Tokyo in 1976 as a way of keeping up with my brother-in-law who had just purchased the K2. By way of background my previous camera was a Kodak Instamatic 304 so I had a lot to learn! I found that having all of the exposure information in a well designed finder allowed me to quickly learn how shutter and aperture were interrelated. It used a true match needle system that I found intuitively easy to learn. It was not long before I mastered the basics and was moving able to move on to advanced tricks for more creative pictures. I tried a Pentax Super Program and an LX for a while, but found myself going back to the KX.</p>