Body & Design
Like last year's Fujifilm XF1, the Pentax MX-1 recalls an era where cameras had metal top and baseplates, with leather around the middle. The MX-1's 'leather' has leather-like texture, but doesn't make much more effort to feel like the real thing, instead looking just like rubber, with the grip you'd expect from high-quality synthetic rubber - good tactility and give, with plenty of grip enhancement without being actually sticky. Pentax was careful to note that the metal top and bottom are cold to the touch, which is true, while painted mag-alloy can be a little warmer.
One notable feature are the two infrared sensors, one front, one back, as seen on many of Pentax's SLRs. Missing, as we've mentioned, are the controls one would expect for the enthusiast shooter. Onscreen menus are similar enough to Pentax SLR design that it's clear they expect Pentax SLR owners to consider an MX-1 for a slot in their camera bag, so it's odd they omitted the ring around the lens. Our sample's firmware wasn't sufficient for accurate screenshots, unfortunately, so we don't want to draw too many conclusions at this point.
Top of camera
The MX-1's top view shows its relative thickness. That leaves plenty of room for a large mode dial, a medium-sized shutter button and zoom toggle, and the exposure compensation dial. Power and movie record buttons are nestled between these larger elements. The power button glows green when on. The tilting LCD is thick too, but the right rear of the camera is a little thinner.
In your hand
The Pentax MX-1's thickness serves as its main grip. Though the camera is hefty, thanks in part to the brass top and bottom plate, the rubber grip on the front also helps. Pentax could have added a little bit more rise under the EV dial to give the camera more of a thumb grip, which may be the main ergonomic weakness (if you can call an essentially boxy design ergonomic at all).
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| The index finger finds the Pentax MX-1's shutter button easily, and my thumb in particular wants to rest on the rear dial, ready to make adjustments. | |
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Tilting LCD
For greater ease when shooting over heads or around corners (in vertical mode) the Pentax MX-1 offers a tilting LCD. It tilts up a little more than 90 degrees and down about 45 degrees. As you'd expect of a camera at this price, the MX-1 has a 920k dot screen, giving a 640 x 480 pixel display.
Variation of maximum aperture with focal length
As with most compact zooms, the Pentax MX-1's maximum aperture of F1.8 only applies at wide angle, but the lens stays relatively fast as the lens zooms to 112mm. The table below shows the maximum aperture at each of the focal lengths shown (as 35mm equivalents):
| Equiv Focal Length | 28mm |
35mm |
50mm |
60mm |
85mm |
112mm |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Max aperture | F1.8 |
F1.9 |
F2.1 |
F2.2 |
F2.3 |
F2.5 |
This is quite good performance, one of the MX-1's primary strengths. Note that the Pentax MX-1 we received does not indicate focal length on screen, so focal lengths and apertures were obtained by snapping a series of images and pulling the data from the EXIF files.
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