EDIT 12.23.2010:
There are some new questions down there http://www.polycount.com/forum/showp...7&postcount=16

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I got this 140€ Aiptek/Genius/noname "Media Tablet 14000U" since approx 2 years now. The active area measures 12" x 7 1/4" an I bought it with the intension of "bigger is better".
Now lately these 2 other Tablet threads were starded here and some told that it is a matter of prefearance if one ues a small or a big tablet. It got something to do with drawing from the wrist or the whole arm. I can't realy tell what I do, my huge tablet foced me to draw with the arm, yet I feel more comftable when drawing from the wrist when I do it on paper (and I rotate the paper alot).

What I can definately tell is that, the first monent I used my tablet I could not handle this "looking at the screen and drawing below your nose". I can't get a decent circle when not looking at my pens tip and see it moving. So I thought about gettign myself a Tablet with display. Now there are these two Wacom Cintiq Tablets with 1000$ and 2000$, defiantely nothing for a hobby artist like me. I tried googling for "display tablet", "screen tablet", "tablet monitor", "wacom cintiq alternative" etc., additionaly I am NOT a online shopper at all, thus got not much "experiance" with finding products online. I stubled over some weird Terminal PCs, I-pads, and tablet notebooks mainly at amazon.de.

So some questions appear to me, that I would like to ask you professionals and experianced people:

• Are there any cheap (below 300€) alterantives to the wacom cintiq?
• Would a tablet notebook do the job too, meaning is it as precise as a real tablet? I think about getting myslef a laptop aswell, so that would be a opporunity.
• I do not have the opporunity to test small VS big tablets, there ain't any electronic shops in my town that offer any tablets. Is it realy a difference? Can't you just zoom out in your app and draw from the wrist then?
• Do you have any problems to draw on a surface you do not directly look at, is that a matter of training? Is it a good idea for a realtively unexperianced beginner to buy a tablet with screen or ,like stated above, should I train more? What expericance did you make when you started with tablets?

That about covers it for now ;P

In that price range a Motion LE 1600 (or lower model) on ebay might be a good fit. Don't expect to do much if any 3d work on it though. Also IIRC the screen res is 1024 x 768 so Photoshop will probably feel really cramped.

I've got a Toshiba m200 which runs at a 1400 x 1050 resolution so it's not too bad although it's a horrible tn panel lcd screen which means the colors and contrast change when viewing the screen from different angles.

The only other drawback of tablet pcs is finding the right pen, most only have a left and right click. You need to get a wacom duo switch pen or one of the older cintiq pens to get a middle mouse button, those pens seem to be pretty rare these days.

How long have you used your tablet? It takes time to get used to them.

The Motion LE 1600 and the Toshiba m200, are these touchscreens?
When I draw my hand rests on the tablet, wouldn't that make me draw with the ball of the hand instead of the pen or at least cause some funky lines?

My current Pen also just got 2 Buttons the Scroll wheel is on the tablet itself.

I got my tablet since 2 years, but do not use it on a regular basis.
Mostly for concepting models or to practice anatomy, I do not sculpt much. I think I do not use it often since i feel somewhat uncoftable with it.
And I use SketchBook Pro for drawing, if that matters.

Its a case of practicing, I had the same problem switching to my tablet. It took a long time to become comfortable. now i use it for everything.

So far as size goes were taught in college to draw from the shoulder. Personally i found my line quality and general flow/confidence really increase when i got used to drawing with my whole arm. Have you tried working a little bigger on paper? Using your arm can often give your line better flow and confidence

I do not draw on paper often anymore, just to become better with the tablet.
Mostly I draw on paper just because my Tablet is not at hand.
Also, I am not that good at drawing in general.

Thats my last drawing so it schould somewhat reflect my current skill level.

Personaly I think I need a lot more practice, good thing that summer vacation starts tomorrow
So it's not that a tablet with display needs less training to draw on?

Those two tablets I mentioned are pretty old, not touch screens, just pen input. If you use sketchbook pro as your main painting/drawing app then screen res shouldn't be too much of an issue as it's UI seems to be pretty minimal from what I've seen.

Tablet pcs are really easy to draw on, but their screen size is fairly small. Like drawing on a piece of printer paper. The m200s screen is great for drawing but not so good for texturing because of the color/contrast issue. I think the Motion tablets have much better screens, something like 180° viewing angle so I'm thinking they would be better for color work.

I don't draw too much lately but I do use my wacom 9x12 for just about everything, if only I could get the pen to work well with UDK... I switched from using a mouse mostly to reduce the chance of developing carpal tunnel.

Dont mean to hijack the thread but Ben you said you can use other pens on tablets? Just wondering cause I have an Intuos 3 and as part of our college fees we get a bamboo so was wondering if I can use my Intuos 3 pen instead of the Bamboo? I've tried the bamboo pen and didnt like it much...

Ben Apuna:
Thanks for these suggestions so far!
You know of any other manufacturers that produce Screen Tablets like Wacom?
So no Tablet PC just a tablet that needs a PC to work.
I concider buying a laptop or tablet PC but I would prefear a plain tablet.

Nope I don't think the bamboo and intuos are compatable. I wish all wacom pens were compatible with each other but sadly it isn't so

Found this pic on the somewhere though I don't remember where.... Anyway it's showing which pens should work with Tablet PCs and which won't.

There might be a few other manufacturers, however judging by the quality of standard wacom tablets vs other brands I'd say unless it's wacom it's probably going to suck.

There was a post a while back about how to put together cintiq like thing from a salvaged laptop screen and a big wacom but I think the problem with that was the real cost ended up being near enough to a small wacom cintiq that it made it not worthwhile considering the chance of successfully putting it together seemed rather low at best.

EDIT:

Well here's the *product* I dunno... buyer beware I guess. The page that linked to that product page.

I used to have an Adesso. It was more than adequate, it certainly didn't suck, but my Intuos 3 is a lot better. The fact tht it's got a smaller active area is indeed a factor.

I had 2 Aipteks before throwing down the cash for a wacom, they sucked. You would think I would've learned the first time, lol

Woah thats pretty sweet Ben. I have a Intuos 3 9 x 12 (these things are monsters) so 225 to turn it almsot into a cintiq would be sweet. I think I have a friend who might have a spare LCD though I would need to get an enclosure and the controller. Definitely a great way to get some extra mileage.

Just to make this a little clearer, I am not looking to replace my aiptec with a wacom. I am looking to repace my no-screen tablet for one with screen, if the price tag is allright that is.
I can't say wether my aiptek I got here is worse than a wacom, but the preasure sensety feels a bit strange and the whole hotkey mamager stuff feels kinda cheap. I suppose wacom solved all this way better.
As a pure hoby artis I feel hapy with my tools though and getting another "noname" tablet with screen for arround 300€ would make me even more happy ;)

But as r_fletch_r said, I probably just need some more practice and not necesarily a screen-tablet. But if there is a ceap manufacturer out there I would give it a try neverless.

Ben Apuna:
That tablet modding isn't realy suitable for me. I wonder why aiptec got no such screen tablets :S

Hate when some people do like i will right now..
the link! http://www.wacom-components.com/engl...ner/index.html
There is some tablets pc, that have a touchscreen with preasure sens uses wacom technology.
I've just looking some of these for myself.. soo.. maybe helpfull

If someone use some of this for drawing/sculpting, rendering?), so please tell your opinion

/bump: New Question
So I am still sitting here with my Aiptek tablet and it still did not give up on me.
I don't have the pssibility to test a wacom tablet my self, so I can't realy compare it with my current one. There are several threads here on PC thats point is simply "get a wacom, it's worth it".

No if I would get myself a wacom, the only thign to consider is whether one draws from shoulder or wrist, since that would determien the size I need.
I think I draw from the wrist, but the tiem with my 305x185 active area forced me to draw a little more from the shoulder, so I feel somewhat in between. The Bamboo seems to be the prefeare tablet for beginners, but since I already use mien for quite some time, I am not shure if a bamboo would take me a step back quality whise.
Thats why I consider buying a Intuos4 M. M because it's a little smaller than my current one so that might go better with my dominating wrist drawing. I think a S might be to small, but then aggain I am realy not shure. This is what I am refering to atm http://www.wacom.com/intuos/compare.php.

Now before I eve ncontinue telling never-ending sorries about my "problems" I go ahead and ask some questions if it's even woth gettign a new tablet when my old oen still does it's job, so here we go:

• The Intuos got preasure and tilt sensity, but also rotation? Google says so, yet I can't find anything abotu it in the official documents.
• Is rotation and tilt actualy REALY usefull (for PS in my case)?
• It got 8 "Expres Keys", my aiptek got 36 macro keys that are at the borders of the active area. I activate them by clicking on them with the pencil, not by hand. Now I only use like 10-12 of them, but does the Intuos realy just have 8 or are these express keys something else and it also got customizable macro keys?
• Will S size deliver all the comfort of M size, considering im a wrist drawing person, or is it maybe to small for navigating propperly in a 3D app?
• Is there realy a notable difference between wacom and non-wacom? Most Polycouters seem to say so, so ther got something about it.

I know the best sollution to all this questions would be to test it myself. One of my friends onws a Bamboo (pen & touch?), but I was currently looking out for a Intuos.

Why do we need to have these conversations over and over and yet over again? Been discussed to death several times before and not just here, best pick is usually the intuos series with the A5 (medium sized).
We have a few concept artists here who use a tablet constantly, some of them got a oversized one at first but they all reverted to the medium size because its the perfect size. Anyway do a Google search because like said this stuff has been discussed to death.

renderhjs:
I realy try not to start useless conversations here on PC.
Thats one of the reasons I used this old existing thread and did not start a new one (maybe you just dindn't notice that this is a old one). I also checked most of the treads that turend up when searching for "Wacom tablet" and these answered some questions, yet the five above still remain.
So as I said, I googled but found controverse information about the pen roatation, I don't trust random google search results as much as answers dircetly from professionals. I just recently figured out that you need a special pen, the Intuos 4 Art Pen to get rotation sensitivity.

But honestly, is it realy that wrong to ask professionals bevore I spend hundrets of dollars? There is a reason why these threads pop up frequently.

Hi 5, I think what you can do to see whether you need a S or M size tablet is to cut a piece of paper following the size they provide in their website and try to draw with a pencil in that limited space, guess its the most close representation of the tablet "draw region" before you actually spend some cash on the actual tablet. I got graphire 4 S size and works perfect for me but at work they provide intuos 3 M size that I had a little hard time adjusting my hand to the space they have, but after a few days using it its all good now. If you take the conclusion it's all come back to you getting use to it.

For the wacom vs non-wacom stuff, I got a friend at IT dept store who sells tablet (from many brands) and what he said was that the consumer who bought wacom never come back with complain about it, but the non-wacom consumer lots of them come back and complain with the products after few months/years. So yea you get the idea, wacom can save you money in the future cus you can use it for 5-10 years from now.

_Revel

Revel:
Thanks for the info! You say you use a Inuos at work, can you tell me about these macro keys it got? My aiptek got 36 of them and I can assing Keyboard shortcuts and .exe files to them. They are activated by tipping with my pen on them, not by hand. The wacom buttons are pressed by hand, only 8 of exist and it got this "touch-ring", does it also have this active area buttons? It certainly does not seem like, but I'd like to ask anyways :p

Edit:
I cut out the sizes of the active areas now, M seemed qutie small at first, but on the L there is a lot of useless space when drawing. Yes I think M will do just right. Thanks for the suggestion Revel ;)

hey...
i just wanted to throw in juist a little bit of my experience:

i got myself a big DinA4 tablet back when i started...
now, a little over 2 or 3 years later i got one at office, being DinA5.

now reverting back from the smaller one to the bigger one feels really awkward, a smaller tablet is definatly much handier (though that is my own experience, you may find it being differently...

I'm not sure about the macro keys as I haven't explore that deep but what I can tell from the hardware it self it has only 8 buttons (4 left 4 right) and don't have the touch ring (it's on intuos 4, as at work it's intuos 3 which has 2 touch strips instead of ring). What do you mean by "active area button"? not sure really get what you mean.

Honestly I'm not really care about the button they have on the tablet since the keyboard still in reachable area with my hand and I don't see a point going through assigning all the shortcut keys to that button, also my hands are used to reach keyboard instead of button in intuos :p

The only thing that I set with the wacom is the button on the pen instead of double click (by default) to middle click heheh..

_Revel

Originally Posted by Revel

What do you mean by "active area button"? not sure really get what you mean.

There, as you see the "K-Buttons" are no actual butons, they are inside the active area of my tablet and get activated when I "paint" on them. So with my tablet I can't assign i.e. Ctrl to a button and hold it while drawing, since I need the pen to hold it. I prefear "real buttons" since they allow me what I just described. I was jsut curious if the wacom tablets have this too. I don't find anything about this, so I doubt that. I normaly got my keyboard in reach too, but beeing able to sit back (I got a couch next to my PC) and just use the Intuos, shure will be a nice experiance.

xXm0RpH3usXx:
Seems like bigger is not necessarily better in this case :p
If I don't force myself to draw from the shoulder I don't do it and for wrist drawing M does just fine (from what I can tell with Revel's paper test).

One more question about the Intuos4 touch ring: Does the button in the middle just toggle the rings behaviour or can you cnage it to also toggle sets of Hotkeys?

agree with renderhjs.

Err..I can't give you any info about intous4 since i never use it before. But then again 5, if you still comfortable with your current tablet why bother to buy another tablet just because people say it's the best? just wait until your current tablet break down then you know what to buy next hehehh..

_Revel