Pentax K200D Review

Company partnerships are like Hollywood marriages – we never expect them to last. And yet, as Pentax and Samsung head into their second wave of joint-venture cameras, it seems this could be more of a Douglas and Zeta-Jones than the Hindenburg of a union that was Pamela Anderson and Kid Rock.

The K200D certainly follows the same blueprint as previous generations, and feels like the less-paranoid version of the Samsung GX-20 (itself almost identical to the K200D’s big brother, the K20D).

As such, it feels like it could hammer nine-inch nails into brick walls. Not that we’d suggest testing out that theory.

Display woe
Unfortunately that means some of the same complaints can be levelled at it. Particularly irritating is that the LCD on the back isn’t live while shooting – you have to press the Info button to make it display aperture size, shutter speed, ISO and so on, so you’re forced to use the top-mounded display more. Annoying.

Performance, again, is similar to the Samsung GX-20’s, despite this camera having a different sensor.

Review continues after the break...

The 10megapixel images are nice and contrasty, if unremarkable, the autofocus is very nippy and the image stabiliser is superb.

This isn’t one for action photographers, though, as the continuous shooting is less than 3fps.