>> I just hope that this trend will not mirror the "Super Program/A to >> Program Plus/A to P bodies" trend of the 1980's.
> (scratching head and smiling politely) sorry, me no speakum Pentax..... No problem, John, but I suspect that some of the Pentax aficionados might know what I'm referring to: Much of the Pentax history of the late 1970's and early 1980's consisted of a series of improvements, one right after another, as the camera line got stronger and stronger. (This is oversimplified, of course, because there were a few "branches" in the Pentax evolutionary tree at that time.) However, after the release of the Super Program (North American name) or Super A (rest of world name) in 1983, the next body released (1984) was the Program Plus (N.A. name) or Program A (r.o.w. name), which was good, but which was basically a somewhat stripped/simplified version of the Super Program/A. Next came the A3000 (N.A. name) or A3 (r.o.w. name) which was a very basic perhaps overly automatic body in comparison to either the Super Program/A and the Program Plus/A. Following the A3000/A3, came the several P bodies, most of which were fairly simple bodies, and all still more basic than the Super Program/A. (This is not intended to be taking a "cheap shot" at the P bodies, some of which are quite serviceable if basic manual focus bodies.) During this time, autofocus had arrived on the scene, but Pentax seemed to be in a sad rut, turning out more-and-more-basic, more-and-more-automatic manual focus SLR's. The pioneering autofocus ME-F of 1981 was not a commercial success, and Pentax produced no more autofocus bodies until 1987, when it finally came out with the SF1 (N.A. name) or SFX (r.o.w. name). Of course, there were other Pentax events going on - the LX went on and on, etc. - but, as you maybe can see, there seemed (to me) to be a period of deepening malaise in the Pentaxian world back in the mid-1980's. So, I was merely commenting that I hoped that the trend in Pentax's DSLR's was not going to mirror the trend in its SLR's of the mid-1980's. [Disclaimer: All of the above, I should point out, is my own personal take on a certain time period in Pentax history, and some might disagree with some or all of my generalizations.] Fred
