Pentax Optio S40

Pre-PMA 2004: In their second announcement of the day Pentax introduce the Optio S40, a four megapixel digital camera in a metal case and utlizing Pentax's unique sliding lens mechanism which we first saw on the Optio S this time last year. The S40 has 11 MB of built-in flash storage as well as an SD/MMC slot, it's powered by either CR-V3 or AA batteries and has a 1.6" LCD monitor.

Pentax Optio S40

Steve's Conclusion Another new camera from Pentax this year (2004), the Optio S40 is a compact, stylish, and extremely durable camera that is loaded with features usually found on larger, more expensive digicams. It combines a 4-megapixel imager with a smc (super multi coated) Pentax 3x optical

Key controls on Pentax's Optio S40 are accessed via the top-mounted mode dial, which has a central on/off switch and settings for full auto ('Easy Mode', which is identified by a green smiley face icon), program AE, Picture Mode (which accesses the scene settings), night-scene, landscape and portrait modes, movie capture, and voice clip recording. In the Easy Mode setting users have push-button access to a Help screen, which describes the functions controlled by each button. This works in both capture and playback modes.

Pentax has taken its polished S4 model and offered a “lite” version to newcomers