Performance

Performance
The most disappointing aspect of the camera is its slowness in burst mode, and how quickly the buffer fills up. This is an area where the camera fails to compete with other current models, and makes the camera less than ideal for fast action, or even slow action – the AF can keep up but the recording can’t.

The AF matches that of other recent Pentax models – that is, it’s adequate rather than blindlingly quick. It is rather let down by the standard kit lens, which is slow and pretty noisy. Investment in better lenses will improve the speed and the sound levels of the AF.

There is an argument that the AF is of less importance to a proportion of existing Pentax users however, as the lens mount accepts older manual K lenses, so there will be a small audience for Pentax purists using manual lenses (along with manual mode).

Image stabilisation varies in performance, depending on what’s being photographed. Sometimes I only managed to shoot successfully at the 55mm end of the lens using a shutter speed of 1/45sec, which is hardly earth-shattering. I was less than happy with slower speeds, with camera shake occurring more frequently, though I did achieve the occasional sharp shot.