Pentax's new Optio point-and-shoots are alive with the sound of megapixels

If you’re in the market for a new pocket camera, you could do worse than a Pentax. My friend just bought one from the old generation and she likes it, but when she sees these she’ll be mad. Click the link below for the whole menagerie, in arbitrary order since there are no prices and some are better than others in different ways. All the cameras have USB 2.0 high speed interfaces and good stuff like face recognition built in.

Optio S12 (pictured above)

5.3 oz, 12 megapixels (special 1.7″ sensor with primary color separation), 3x optical zoom (come on now), 64-3200 ISO, 2.5″ LCD

Optio E50

5.8 oz, 8 megapixels (2.5″ sensor), 3x optical zoom, 100-1600 ISO, 2.4″ LCD

Optio M50

We have a price on this one, $230. It’s got the nicer zoom and the best ISO range, so it’s probably the high end.

Optio A40

5.3 oz, 12 megapixels (that 1.7″ sensor again), 3x optical zoom, 50-1600 ISO, 2.5″ LCD

I’m not sure what I’d go with. The Olympus FE-3xx series we saw yesterday may actually be a better deal from what I’m seeing here on paper, but in the end the true test is image quality and usability, not to mention price. We’ll keep you guys updated.