Customer Reviews

Pentax X90 Digital Camera - Metallic Blue (12MP, 26x Optical Zoom) 2.7 inch LCD

5 star:		(7)
4 star:		(11)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

We had spent a long time checking out cameras as our old point and click was dying slowly ... I had finally settled on Panasonic's similar one to this: loads of excellent reviews and obviously well-used by a large number of people. In fact I had virtually ignored this particular camera as there was only a small handful of reviews ... hence I'm writing this to boost the numbers as the world needs to know how good it is!!
The Pentax X90 is amazing! We are pretty hopeless knowing SLR type manual settings, but the automatic settings plus the huge range of various possible modes where you need a little extra help, (sunsets, night time, sports etc) are wonderful. We can't believe some of the shots we've taken - needless to say our favourites are the incredible telephoto ones (clear in spite of wobbly hands due to the Shake Reduction function - even without a tripod most of the time) and also the macro shots that show such detail ... not sure I always want to see insects like that!
Frankly, we are amazed at the great pictures we are getting with little effort. The other thing is that we are looking at our world differently now - looking for new angles, interesting views, plants and insects that we wouldn't normally look at. The zoom is simply phenomenal. We have an excellent pair of binoculars, but the Pentax zoom is even better than these as, short of using a tripod, the binoculars are always shaking at long distances - we can take a photo and, Abracadabra, the photos is solid and un-blurred! Neat!
Light and easy to carry - not sure how robust it is as we've only had it 6 weeks and we've been treating it very, very gently - never had a camera as good as this!

I have used Canon cameras for quite a long time and when my son decided that he needed to "borrow" my Canon supershot I looked around to see what I could replace it with. All the cameras in that range seemed to have dispensed with the view finder, something which I find invaluable in framing a picture. I looked at the Pentax X90 and liked what I saw.
I have had this camera for some six weeks now and overall I am very happy with it. Battery life is good, lasting for just under 300 frames of fine standard. The quality of images produced is excellent,sharp and clear.The range of options within the menu is staggering. My only gripe is that the zoom facility does not allow you to zoom back if you need to without going all the way and then having to re frame to get the image you want. It would be better if you could go partially back to change rather than going the whole hog!!
Overall I would recommend this camera despite not being too sure about the colour!!

It does what it promised. I purchased it for my wife who is the family photographer. She finds it simple to use and it produces excellent family photos.

I was upgrading to a bridge camera from a compact and had no experience or knowledge of what I was after. This was the first I came across in a high street store and liked the specs on it, but it was not powered up so I could not play with it. I looked at many other bridge cameras and none seemed to have the same optical zoom of the Pentax so I just ordered it blindly. My assessment so far can only be described as WOW! The camera does everything I require it to do taking Macro shots to full zoom pictures which have come out superbly and beyond expectations. I have even used the video capture on this camera and once again it was easy to use and effortless with good results. I have already recommended this camera to members of my family and although still early days "no regrets" and as mentioned previously "WOW"

I bought this versatile camera a few months back to take with me on travels, and so far have been very pleased with it. I have held off on reviewing until now so that I know its pros and cons well, and these may be of interest to people, like myself, who want to good superzoom camera with plenty of functionality but without the cost of an SLR.

In my opinion, the Pentax X90's strengths are as follows:

1) Obviously - the zoom power, which makes taking long distance pics of the natural world (and zooming to avoid obstructions in compositions) very easy. As far as I can tell, the 26x is all without compromising picture quality; beyond that it becomes a digital zoom and the quality becomes more grainy. A tripod is needed at that level for stability.
2) Ease of use - the camera is easily operable without many, or any, checks of the manual, and on the whole, works intuitively in taking photos reviewing them, and altering them etc.
3) The X-90 has built in software to allow black and white, colour-emphasis and other tints, and other special effects on photos you have taken.
4) Picture quality is pretty good - colours are reasonably vivid. It pales, as expected, in any comparison with SLR cameras - my girlfriend's
Olympus PEN pictures are always deeper in colour and visual depth - but for a camera half the price and with its own strengths, this is acceptable.
5) There are a very wide range of Mode settings (sunset, low light, landscape, sports etc etc) and video is easy to shoot.

Weaknesses:

1) There may be a way around this but it's not at all obvious how to set the camera *always* to revert to a narrower ISO range on start up - it constantly defaults to 100-800 and this produces far too much brightness in resulting photos. I have had to manually set the camera each time I switch it on to 200 max, which is not ideal.
2) Start up is not super-quick and, I think, has slowed from perhaps 5 seconds fro pressing ON to being ready to shoot, to 7 or 8 as my memory card fills up. Frustrating if you need to take a very quick image.
3) In review mode, you can rotate images to view them but when transferred to a computer they remain un-rotated.
4) The casing for the X90 feels a little too plasticky and light for my liking.

Overall I do recommend this camera as great value for money and a solid performer. If you can put up with the slight weaknesses I list above then this is a very good choice at under £300.

I have had this camera for a couple of months now and i love it!
I have produced great close ups when in Rome recently, without a tripod. Panorama photos are quite difficult in bright light but i`ve taken some good ones. I`m an amateur and havent really used all the settings, ie xposure, shutter speed etc.
I have found it a bit hard taking photos of my grandson as he wont stay still, but need to master the manual controls really.
I would recommend this camera for a starter Slr, or for someone with a keen interest in photography.
The price is really good and worth the money, i dont feel its cheap and plasticky.
^6 months on......
the shutter/zoom button has started to stick which means i have to turn the camera off and on to reset it to enable me to take a photo. If this continues, i will be returning the camera

This is a really good camera for the price range. I bought it as a Christmas present so the online price now seems to have increased!! I bought it to get my partner to use a decent digital camera instead of a really out of date 35mm film SLR.
The next range would be the digital SLR cameras. The camera takes good clear photos, better than the 35mm and cheaper to print.
It has a rechargeable Li-on battery. Much better than using AA's.
The only disappointment is not with the camera but the absence of a British AC figure eight power supply cable to charge the battery.
Really annoying for something actually sold in Britain and if you do not already have one in the house.

It is much better than I expected! It is perfect even shooting at full zoom. The antishake allow you to have clear pictures also at full zoom. The macro mode is perfect too and I cannot find any aberration. It fully worth the price. Have in mind that I was quite fussy with bridge camera as I came from reflex world. No way that I will carry on again my bag of obiective now when with this camera I have the full range. Last thing it is very intutive and easy to use.

THE PENTAX X90 IS A GREAT CAMERA I WRITE THIS AFTER USING FOR 4 WEEKS AND ALSO TOOK IT ON HOLIDAY.
IT HAS LOTS OF SHOOTING MODES AND THEY ARE ALL EASILY ACESSIBLE

On the whole, I am delighted with this camera (especially as I bought it when Amazon were selling it for £179) I might have chosen differently had it been on offer at the current £269.99!

It is capable of taking very good quality pictures - I have only two small niggles with it:

The shutter lag is quite noticeable and is worse than my Lumix TZ3.

Picture quality in low light situations leaves a lot to be desired and is often very grainy.

Video quality is quite good and the ability to use digital zoom while shooting video is useful ( the Lumix does not allow zoom with video at all) - though I would have preferred optical zoom :-)