5 stars (with small drawbacks)

I bought the "Q" as a small camera in addition to DSLR (Pentax K-5) and spiegellosens system camera (Olympus Pen E-P1). In principle, a Lumix LX5 or Samsung EX1 would be just as useful, but me has the opportunity to the next "Toy Lenses" and others can experiment with different C-Mount lenses also once irritated. The 5 star refer to the comparison with other compact cameras.

Suffice it to say once:

1) The Q is small, most likely comparable with a LX5. It is but compared "rich" in his hand. By the metal casing gives it a similar significance as a shrunken Pentax K-5 or Oly Pen.
2) Mode Dial and dial have very defined locking points
3) Obektiv: I have "only" the kit with the bought "01 Prime". The lens works quite "valent" snaps also "fed" into a bayonet.
4) flash: the works for a compact camera really well. Whether making a positive impact in the right flashed shots will still have. This mechanism also acts "valent".

Haptic considered the camera is so small "Handschmeichlerin". I enjoyed taking pictures with the "little ones" of the first shot of fun and the review could sin hereby already finished.

For those who still search for rational reasons for the Q, maybe that helps so:

- Very quiet shutter sound
- Closure is integrated and electronically in Ojektiv. This is the camera z. B. also much quieter and faster than when triggered a Oly Pen.
- Built-in ND filter at the Prime Standard
- Interval recording ability and integrated time-lapse video function
- Blitz is as already mentioned very far away for a compact camera from the lens axis
- Manual focusing (via focus ring on the lens) for a compact camera very easy and practically well applicable, unfortunately there is no electronic viewfinder
- "Green Button" makes manual photographing very simple (by pressing this button can, for example, in the manual mode shutter speed and aperture of the Program AE are set as initial values.)
- Housing is very compact (about the size of a "100" cigarettes).
- Pocket tripod for compact cameras is sufficiently stable (the Pen E-P1 with pencake is eg already too heavy.).
- Both battery and memory card can be the side switch (again an advantage for tripod use).
- Reliable live histogram, which also takes into account exposure
- Exposure Compensation +/- 3 EV possible

However, there are in my view also some criticisms:

- Display difficult to read in bright sunlight and no electronic viewfinder available
- Noise from ISO 800 more pronounced than in the current 1 / 1.6 "or 1 / 1.7" cameras.
- Except in the vicinity of potential for barely accented game with the depth of field (apart from the "Blur Control" function).
- 01 Standard Prime recorded for a fixed focal length too strong (but the distortion is in both the camera as well, for example in Lightroom using the existing correction profile very well corrected.).
- Low battery, a second battery is in my opinion duty.
- Display resolution is not quite up to date

What I would like to see more (and should be implemented as a firmware update):

- "Distance scale" during manual focusing on the screen
- Possibility of the lens when you turn on to provide "infinite" (such as at the Oly Pens and DSLRs.)
- Possibility of combining AF + MF (manual "override" the video selected by AF focus target)
- Quick-Dial: Similar to the K-5 should be able to store and retrieve (the functions of the Green button, the ND filter and the focus type so, for example.) With the Quick Dial the complete User Settings. Currently, the Quick-Dial settings are only relevant for JPEGs.

EDIT 11/05/2012:

On 25/10/2012 Pentax implemented with firmware version 1.10 also focus peaking, now you can focus very well manually with Q.

Furthermore, I also have the JPEG problem when using the Quick Dials solved so that I have extended the picture display time to 3 seconds. Since pressure on the exposure compensation button (+/-) can be the last-captured image (JPEG) stored as RAW, which a viable variant of photos is to create a little more "potential" also a RAW copy for me. The other way round is at the zero position of the Quick-Dial wheel the default setting of the camera (in my case with RAW Speicerung) is applied and here I can turn subsequently generate a JPEG on-camera RAW development when needed.