The Optio S6 features a Pentax 6.2-18.6mm 3x optical zoom with a 35mm equivalent focal length of 38 - 114mm, the maximum aperture is f2.7 - f5.2. The lens is all glass and consists of 6 elements in 5 groups with 2 dual-sided aspherical elements. When the camera is powered down the lens is retracted inside of the body and a built in shutter closes to protect the lens.

It has a 5-point AF system with user-selectable AF point location, Spot AF, infinity landscape, panfocus and manual focus with an AF-assist lamp. The focusing range in Normal mode is 1.31 ft (0.4m) to Infinity; Macro mode: 5.9 inches (0.15 m) to 1.64 ft (0.5m); Manual Focus from 5.9 inches (0.15m) to Infinity at 6.2mm

You review and frame your pictures with the 2.5" color LCD with 232,000 pixels, there is no optical finder. The LCD has approx. 100% coverage and histogram display.

The built in flash offers Auto, On, Off, Auto + Red-Eye Reduction, On + Red-Eye Reduction. Flash range is approx. 0.49 -17ft (0.15 - 5.1m) (Wide at ISO Auto), approx. 1.31 - 8.9ft (0.4 - 2.7m) (Tele at ISO Auto).

On the top is the On/Off power button and the shutter release.

In the upper right hand corner is the zoom control which also functions as the index/magnify control in playback mode. The Play button (blue arrow) allows you to quickly switch to playback mode.

The 4-way controller lets you navigate menus and select images during playback. In record mode you press "Up" to enable remote or selftimer mode, "Left" for flash mode, "Right" for focus mode and "Down" calls up the virtual mode dial which we'll detail on the next page.

Pressing the MENU button calls up and dismisses the onscreen menu system. The Quick "green" button switches the camera to Green mode (fully automatic), serves as image Delete in playback.

The I/O ports:

The DC IN jack is for the optional AC power adapter or an external battery pack.





The PC/AV port handles both the USB connection for download and the audio-video output for TV display. The Optio s6 is PictBridge compatible for direct printing.

The Optio S6 is equipped with 23MB of internal memory and has a Secure Digital (SD) card slot in the battery compartment for optional memory cards. It's compatible with any capacity SD memory card. Data recorded on the internal memory can be copied to SD card.

The Optio S6 is powered by a proprietary D-LI8 3.7V 710mAh rechargeable lithium-ion battery pack. Pentax claims the battery life is good for approx. 130 shots (LCD turned on and using the flash 50% of the time), continuous playback time is approx. 130 minutes. Charging time is a maximum of 100 minutes.