The core of my complaint is that they are not acting like a company that is willing (or capable?) of competing with Canon or Nikon. For three years they teased us with the promise of a 645D, then abandoned it- only to tease us more by saying that even though the 645D would not be pursued they had not abandoned medium format digitals. The same thing happened a few years ago with their first digital body. It was to be a DSLR targeted at pro's, once released it would be followed by a series of lenses and flashes, putting the Pentax line on par with the best offerings of Canon and Nikon. A handful were released for field testing only to be recalled due to overheating problems (something that also apparently plauged the 645 digitals).
I guess what I am really looking at from Pentax is a sign of life. In the age of film they largely abandoned the pro market for the consumer market and honestly did quite well until the days of auto focus, and they haven't seemed to catch up since. They still target the consumer market, but don't seem to understand that even in the consumer market there is a demand for high end flashes, fast lenses etc.... Look at how many amateurs on DPC own Canon 70-200 2.8's (just to name one). I would love to have access to features found in the most recent Canon and Nikon flashes, but I have to hope a 3rd party matches those and decides to put them into a Pentax compatible form, its the same with lenses. Pentax may now have a midrange constant aperture zoom, but there is no 70-200 2.8 in the lineup- you have to go either Sigma or Tamron for that (I played with both last weekend- I was impressed with the Tamron optics, but the function of the lens was clunky, the Sigma was soft around the edges, but certainly operated better).
Pentax is breathing, but does it have a pulse? I guess we'll see in the next few days if they announce anything more. It is a frustrating time for me as a Pentax owner, I want to upgrade- and can afford to upgrade, but the options are so limited that it makes me wonder if it isn't time to put a Nikon or Canon under my name.
I left the 15mm off my original list because they only announced it was "under development." Like I said above, we heard that for three years on the 645D.
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