I bought this camera a couple months ago because I wanted a small digital camera that would be easy to carry with me. Since then, I've found the S5i to be a wonderful camera that takes clear colorful pictures and can easily fit in your pocket.

Here are some praises for the S5i:

1. This camera is TINY. It is smaller than my cellphone. This makes it extremely easy to bring with when going on a trip or just out for the day. I have it in my pocket at all times, ready to capture any moment. I brought it with on a recent trip and everybody thought it was great. At the end of the day we hooked it up to the TV in the hotel and watched a slide show of the day. Everyone loved it.

2. The battery life in incredible. I have had this thing for a couple months and I have only charged it like 4 times. Even with extended use of the flash and screen, the battery still keeps kicking. Very different from my cellphone!

3. The super macro focus setting creates beautiful photos. This was something I didn't realize the camera had until after I bought it. You can get right up to things and take these really colorful and crisp images. Flowers and plants look incredible.

4. The red-eye reduction is the best I've ever seen. With the red-eye flash mode, the camera flashes once and then about a second later flashes again and takes the picture. None of my pictures suffer from red-eye anymore. The flash is also very powerful.

5. It has many manual settings for more artistic pictures. I still haven't even gotten to check out all the little features this camera comes with. It has a lot of different "scene" presets and also allows you to do manual mode (with focus & exposure).

Overall, this camera met and exceeded all the expectations I had. I would definitely recommend the Pentax S5i to a family member or friend.

I just got this camera a month ago and I am satisfied with it. It has a lot of features despite its size. And for point and shoot I can say it's a great buy, comparable to other power packed cameras, it even takes better pictures sometimes.

But I just had to give it a 4 because I thought I could do more with it. But you can't do much with the settings since it has it's own default settings for certain conditions. But over all it's a great camera. If you're just after taking normal pictures and you want something sleek, this is definitely a good buy.

This product is fantastic!!

For a complete independant review including sample photos go to:

www.imaging-resource.com/PRODS/S5I/S5IA.HTM

I've had this camera since just before Christmas 04. I purchased from www.bhphotovideo.com for about $350. I should have waited until after the holidays, because the price has come down. It is great to finally have a small camera. I often forget that I even have it with me (which I guess can be bad!). Over all the pictures are good. The focus is sometimes soft. It doesn't take good night photos, but takes great daytime pics.

I have owned quite a few digital cameras, all of which seemed to have followed the rules of 'technical tradeoffs':

If you want quality, you pay more and you lose form factor.
If you want form factor, you pay more and you lose quality
If you pay less, you lose on both quality and formfactor.
And so on and so on.

Knowing this, I bought this camera for its form factor and hence did not expect the highest quality pictures. Nonetheless, it has impressed me. I've barely touched the settings since I put the camera on auto focus and auto flash (well, except adjusting white balance).

In fact, this is my second optio. I purchased the 4MP for myself about a year ago, and purchased the 5MP as a gift this year. The S5i has a much bigger and higher quality screen than the 4MP, which makes it easier to decide if you've nailed the shot or not.

Overall, I would suggest this camera for a beginner/casual photographer on the go.

I bought this camera about a month ago but returned it due to lackluster performances. It is not a horrible camera but for the price, I can get a better camera without having to settle for less. I used the camera to snap photographs of my students only to find that the pictures were horribly dark even with the flash. Of the 15 pictures I took, only 2 came out with decent hues; all the other photos were excessively dark to the point that even the students noticed the odd coloring. The camera is known for taking slightly underexposed pictures. I tried to compensate for this by changing the darkness of my photos but this didn't do the trick either. Upon my next major use of the camera, I noticed my pictures were once again horribly dark but this time from the lack of flash capability. The problem of having a small LCD screen such as the one for this camera is that photos appearing clear on the LCD come out blurry when printed. After careful consideration, I returned the camera and am looking into either the Nikon 5900 or the Canon SD400. *fingers crossed*

I hear a lot of grumbling about the camera not being "perfect." But guess what ... in this size and form factor one should not be expecting SLR-like performance. I just purchased this camera last week and have been busy testing it out in a variety of situations. The "Full Auto" mode does a pretty decent job of figuring out the right settings for most situations. If you want you can take total control and set most controls manually. There are even a bunch of pre-programmed setting for different lighting situations and the couple that I tested worked great. All in all, great camera for the size. I like the fact that I can put this in my shirt pocket and forget about it and then when I suddenly need to take a picture I always have the camera handy. I have a normal speed SD Memory card and writing out the images to the card can be painfully slow. This is especially true when trying to take a number of quick shots in rapid succession. The wait for the camera to become ready to take the next shot is annoying. I would highly recommend that you purchase one of the high speed SD cards (often advertised as "Ultra II" or "32X" or "High Speed." All in all a great camera and if you are realistic with your expectations you will be very happy. Good luck!

The camera worked fine; however, after six months, it stopped working. I took it to a Pentax authorized repairer and Pentax refused to pay for the camera because the was dirt and grit in the zoom mechanism. My use was in no way abusive. I had a previous Canon Powershot S200 that lasted forever with the same usage, until I gave it away. I guess I should have stayed with Canon. I bought the Pentax for its size and lightweight, but what good is that if it doesn't last! Don't get the Pentax and expect long term use out of it.

I have had this camera a year now and am VERY impressed. I have used Nikon 35mm SLR's all my life so I was a little hesitant going into digital. Lugging around equipment became too much of a issue so I started looking. Picture quality is great even at full optical zoom. I very rarely use the digital zoom. Most impressive...the camera has taken 2 direct hits on the concrete and (8 months ago) and still works perfectly!

I have been through 6 cameras in the past 3 years, of all different kinds of brands and price. I have changed so many times because they get stolen or broken...this little pentax optio was surprising though! 3 months after having it around, i brought it to the desert and i guess didn't treat it too carefully in the sand, and it stopped working. so i took it back to the shop and they fized it. you know that it fits in an altoid box? well keeping it in there is a good idea, but if you're the type to carry your camera EVERYWHERE, i'd keep it in something more secure.
guess what happened to mine. i was on a balcony and by misguard the camera fell on the floor, and when i picked it up, no more camera in the box!!! i look over the ledge...and the camera is down there, 3 floors down, on the concrete floor. oohhh nooo...wha'ts my dad going to say! not another camera that i brake! how could this happen to me???
well just as i was about to go down and get it, a car starts backing out and rolls onto the camera!! nooooo!!!!!
anyway, a guy who's helping the driver backout notices it and i shout to him it's mine!! he brings it up to me...i don't know how to react, the 6th camera in 3 years!! come on!
anyway, he gives it to me, i turn it on and...IT WORKS! no way this is impossible!! but yes, it worked perfectly well and still works to this day, 3 months later! nothing was damaged, not the screen, not the lens, not the flash. it just got cracked a bit and twisted, and the battery/memory card cover is completely damaged, but it still works like it should!
so that was one of the happiest days for me, finally i was lucky with a camera!

this is a great camera for traveling, it is small enough to fit into your top pocket, so it can go anywhere. the only problem that i have is that there is no underwater housing for it, if there was i would have given it a 5*.

We really like this camera! It's a WHOLE lot better than our previous one, which ran off 4 AA batteries, and ran THROUGH so many AA batteries so quickly that we can't even guess how many $$ that wasted. This Optio camera uses very nice rechargable batteries that cost $5 each through Ebay (don't buy them here on Amazon... ouch!) We've got 3 batteries and are getting two more so that we never even have to worry about power while on a long trip. (The really handy travel charger is also awesome... get it on Ebay for just a few bucks.)

The startup time and shutter speed are very fast, so catching quick pictures is finally possible for us. (My wife no longer threatens to go back to film after using this camera!) Our last camera would take so long to focus that we never got the candid shots we wanted.

The one and only thing that's even a slight problem with this camera is the power button being next to the shutter button. (What clueless engineer thought THAT would be good??) However, now that we've used it a lot, we never hit the button by accident.

All other features of the camera are great. With a 1 GB memory card, we've never ever run out of memory space, even with taking lots of short videos and many many pictures on medium quality.

Great camera, worth every cent. Buy the accessories on Ebay and you'll find that getting everything you need is not very expensive at all. (Actually, we bought the camera on Ebay too, but these reviews are great here on Amazon. Thanks, Amazon!)

This is my 2nd Pentax digital camera, and I have owned it for 2 years. I've always liked the what they have been doing with the sizing of the cameras, keeping the very small. This one is, very small, so it's great for any situation because you can carry it around like a cell phone. Picture quality for the most part, is very good.

The problem I have with this camera is the inconsistant performance. Day time shots are great, but low light or evening shots are not the best. There are different modes you can use, but I have found the night shot mode to be worthless. You have to hold the camera still for several seconds, but my shots have always blurred severely. The other problem I have expirienced is with the shutter release. On most digital cameras, you press the shutter release about 1/2 way and the camera lets you know when it's ready to take the picture (light changing, focus box on lcd, etc.). About 1/3 of the time, this pentax will not take the picture once you think it's ready. It requires about 5-6 additional presses on the shutter release to take the picture. Very annoying when you have someone waiting for you to take their picture and the camera won't work. One other thing is that with all the ultra compacts out now with 2.5" to 3.0" LCDs, this 1.8" is starting to feel quite small.

I have had good luck with Pentax before and I won't let these few annoyances deter me from puchasing another pentax. If you are looking for a small, compact, digital camera, I would suggest other pentax models such as the T10 or T20 which are in the same price range, but newer.

I got this when my Kodak Easy Share broke. I wanted something smaller w/ more pixels. When I got the Optio was suprised by how small it actually is, it really would fit in an altoid container (as pictured).

Things I like about it are it's speed, the clarity of pictures, and the quality of the camera. The # of features.

Things I dislike are the colors are slightly dimmer than my old kodak and the operating menus are difficult to figure out, you definately need to read the manual.

Overall I love this camera, but I did notice the price is up about $50 from when I bought it. I'm not sure how it compares to other cameras in it's new price range.