Any experience with drawing tablets?
 

I'd like to be able to lay in bed and doodle thoughts/pictures at night.
I'd also like to take it outdoors at times to the park or cafe or what not.
I'd also wish to be able to use it for CAD and internet, but those would be secondary features.
Lightweight and wireless would be good.
I'm still not sure about my own parameters in what I'm really looking for, but know I should get back to drawing on a regular basis(in before the pencil and paper comments).

There are plenty of $100-200 drawing pads only.
Very few of these are wireless.
Hooking a laptop video output to the bedroom tv would work. But losing the tv wouldn't allow multi-tasking.
To concentrate on one thing I might as well sit in the office, which would feel more like working instead of playing.

The Draw-On-Tablet + Full-PC I looked at were:
1). iPad looked powerful, versatile, and had a good drawing surface and shading with the side of the pen. Freakin' cool. Everything I desired from above but I don't want to switch over to the Apple platform and fall down the rabbit hole.

2). The SurfacePro3 had Win8.1 had somewhat poor reviews. The SurfacePro4 had Win10 with horrible reviews identifying multiple software and hardware bugs and/or lousy customer service (24% of reviews were 1-star). No way Microsoft.

3). The Wacom Cintiq Companion 2 Amazon.com: Wacom Cintiq Companion 2 - Intel Core i5: 128GB: Computers & Accessories
$1,600-$2,400 yikes. Very heavy and would require a permanent location. Wacon was also reviewed to have lousy customer service so this would be a bit of a gamble if something breaks. I'm not a pro so this would probably be overkill for my needs.

The Draw-On-Tablet-Only I looked at were:
1). Wacom Cintiq 13HD Interactive Pen Display Amazon.com: Wacom Cintiq 13HD Interactive Pen Display (DTK1300): Computers & Accessories
$800. Made in USA I think.
It requires a cord plus another nearby computer to run off of. That gets very complicated in bed when the nightstand is packed full, I've already spilled my food, and dogs and cats are crawling all over.

2). Yiynova MSP19U+ Tablet Monitor Amazon.com: Yiynova MSP19U+ Tablet Monitor,VESA Stand(Mac & Windows Solution): Computers & Accessories
$450. Same setup required.
Looked like pretty good reviews.

3). Ugee 1910B Digital Pen Tablet Amazon.com: Customer Reviews: Ugee 1910B Digital Pen Tablet Display Drawing Monitor 19 Inch LED Screen with 2 Original Cables and 2 Pen Chargers
$430. Same setup required.
May be buggy and bad customer service.


Just wondering if anyone has used any of these products and what features to look out for.

Tough one.

Your first two requirements rule out a "traditional" tablet like a Cintiq. They are big, heavy, cumbersome and need to be tethered. Make no mistake the Wacoms are absolutely best of breed and even the newer knock offs from the Asian market are quite capable if budget is an issue but they are really not practical for portable use.

Tablets work well as sketch drawing devices and falling down the Apple rabbit hole should not be a major deal breaker. I know plenty of people who are Windows based everywhere else but use iPads because they are the best choice for their specific need. Get what works for YOU is the take away here.

Autodesk has some nice apps for iOS and Android.
Drawing App & Painting Software | SketchBook | Autodesk

There is a free feature limited version you can get to try out on your current Android tablet / Smart phone.

But tablets don't necessarily provide the same pressure sensitivity as a Wacom digitizer does, storage and RAM are also limited.

Your "best of both worlds" option would be a convertible laptop like the Lenovo Yoga's or Fujitsu Lifebook.

You get all the benefit of a portable device with reasonable horsepower and somewhat of an upgrade path and a true Wacom digitizer.

You can often find older models in the $500ish range.

Here you go.

OLD But GOOD Tech Thursday- Fujitsu T5010 - Animation Insider

thx sm. I didn't know some of those were made. That is a huge start.

The Wacom is reviewed to be the best, has a good pen on the higher models, and a bumpy screen which provides tactile feedback.
-Their Companion2 is also a full portable PC which rationalizes the price somewhat.
(heck I remember when even the cheapest of the laptops started out at 2 grand and how many $10 100MB Iomega disks did I buy back then).
-There were some complaints about heat spots and the charging plug on that, and a USB port held together by solder on the Intuos pad. I try to be careful but stuff happens.

I gotta do some more thinking on this and see if there is even room. It's easy to go overboard in the toys department while I'm supposed to be trying to minimize.

The Dell XT2 is a good choice for older convertible pen-based. $200 will get you a good one on ebay. (full RAM and an SSD)

For more resolution spend bit more and get a Surface Pro 2.

Both use WACOM digitizers, plus have capacitive touch (ipads have only cap-touch)

Spending even more gets into the Surface Pro 3 & 4. Both of those are n-trig based pens. (similar to WACOM, but AAAA batteries in the stylus. ...but better tracking in the screen corners. )

i have cintiqs at home and work. strongly recommend them, while admitting to most of the faults already listed above.

Thx island et all, will look into those as well. This place is the best. I could handle Win8.1 and a classic shell but Win10 looks like a future headache.
1). Any problems with noticeable parallax on stuff you've used?
(thick glass so the pen tip doesn't touch where it's pointed)

2). Cap-touch. Is that resistive style which requires pressure?

(on a separate note: I once wanted to help create a 3D keyboard for the semi-blind with lit/heated/active-feedback surface. Pins would pop up and create words and maps and pictures to be pressed. Interactive 3D surface. Porn would be awesome. One of the X-Men movies had the concept with a chair.
Something like this except dynamic:
http://forums.pelicanparts.com/uploa...1462379735.jpg)

I love mine and I don't think the limitations for John's desired application are faults.

Just not really the right tool for the job.

The weather here is perfect this week, well between the 24 hour monsoons at least, and I'd love to go sit on the back patio in the fresh air and get some work done.

I've got 3 digitizers already and the thought of shelling out $3,000.00 for a Companion is not palatable.

Doesn't sound as if the OP needs anything 'super-duty'. I still have an AceCad pen / digitizer pad with the fancy leatheretee portfolio. These units can be found dirt cheapo on the auction site. I think mine was under $10 for the entire package - near new.

So if doodling in the back deck in the bright sunlight is your thing, doodle away and then transfer to any PC. The built in mem is nominal but get one thats SD memory card expandable. Handwriting recognition to type is pretty good. Spell check squigly can be opt on/off in other doc programs, so use to your advantage.

Also, you can use as a tablet device operating direct / Windows. Lastly, it will integrate with virtually every CAD or drawing program. Nifty cool tool. You can get pretty creative with one of these.

The Wacom stylus tips are replaceable plastic 'rods' which are often too long, which leads to problems of the cursor existing hidden under a tipped stylus.

http://forums.pelicanparts.com/uploa...1462419930.jpg

If you imagine the field, you can see how shortening the tip converges the cursor. (exaggerated sketch)

http://forums.pelicanparts.com/uploa...1462419988.jpg

That's one parallax type issue. The other is that the screen corners often play hell with the mag-field, causing the cursor to be off quite a bit from the stylus tip. This is only an issue at first, when you go to close a window with the X up in the corner. but whn you find out about "Pen Flicks" you can have the app close with a fast swipe in the direction of your choosing.

These are my settings:

http://forums.pelicanparts.com/uploa...1462420306.jpg

Also, if you go with a Surface Pro 2, spend $10 on a two-button pen/stylus. Toshiba has one that works great.


Cap-touch is like an iPhone. (needs finger) Resistive needs pressure.

On the pins for the blind... I know that one group gave people computer vision by having a very small version of that which blind people would place on and feel with their (very sensitive) tongue. --I thought that rather brilliant.

I should also add that the Dell XT2 came with Win7 and a special screen for outdoor use. They all have a matte finish, but some also have transflective (outdoor) displays. That is, you can see the screen in full sunlight, with the backlight turned off (although it's seen better with the backlight up). The downside is that they max out at 5Gb of RAM. --Will support CAD, but no huge assemblies.

Lenovo has some similar convertible tablets, with great performance, but I don't believe that you can get that outdoor screen.

Oh, and Win 8.1 with Classic Shell is fine. No complaints I can think of.

Thx for the responses. Great info.

I like the Big Chief.

a little ...


http://forums.pelicanparts.com/uploa...1462470506.jpg

http://forums.pelicanparts.com/uploa...1462470514.jpg


Why do you ask? :D

ugggh https://www.reddit.com/r/dadjokes/