Tablet Suggestions?

[Mr. Moon]

As a late birthday gift, my mom sort-of agreed to get me a tablet, if I can tell her which make and model I want. (Yay!)

However, I'm not rich, so she's not about to pay anything above about $1k, unless I can back it up with a good reason. $2-3k is out of the picture compleatly.

I'd like some suggestions, regarding things such as convineince, ease of use, features (what's usefull and what isn't), price, and whatever else you guys can think of. Perferably it'd be something compatable with Corel Painter Essentials 4. If my drawing style comes in to question, take a look at my DA.

Thanks!

[The Unborne]

I own a Wacom Intuos3 9x12 and it does everything I can expect of a drawing tablet. Some may say the 9x12 is pretty big, but I use it so I can simulate my real drawings, usually Im working on 24x18 so I needed to buy something big enough to fit my arm strokes.

For convience and cost I'd go smaller just in case you find drawing with a tablet too awkward for you. Hmm...not much else to say; what are you expecting to do with the tablet only computer drawings? If so I'd go cheap and spend the rest of the money maybe on Photoshop or maybe Illustrator.

[Mr. Moon]

How much did it cost?

Probably just drawing, although I might play with other possibilities. I generaly stick to 8x11 paper, so I'd proably go with something of that size.

[Jokes]

I just bought a wacom bamboo 4x6 (I'm not made of money...) and it's been pretty good so far. If you want to spend money, definitely go the intuos3, you should get change back from $1k.

Also, never play shooters with a tablet. You have been warned.

[The Unborne]

Go to Wacom's website and you'll find all their selections. Mine was around $350 but that was because I had some discounts and stuff. Right now its around $450. You could get that and have some spare cash.

Basically your going to get a tablet that isn't a screen you'll have to look at your moniter while you draw. For around $999-$2500 you can get Wacom's Cintiq series tablet moniters. Tablet moniters will allow you to draw on the screen and see where your lines are going directly.

[Mr. Moon]

Interesting. I went to the Wacom website and took a look around, and a couple of models looked interesting. Immediantly my champange taste was dirrected to the Cintiq12WX. The idea of being able to watch my hand as I draw sounds pretty helpfull, although I doubt Mom'll be able to be talked into buying that when the Intous and Bamboo Fun are much cheeper, and probably just as good. My style will probably adapt itself to the tablet.

[Flickerdart]

I mean sure, you could get a Cintiq for $1000. But for less, you could get a Gateway C-141X Tablet PC, which is just as good but also a freaking laptop to boot, and a good one at that.

What's this you say? The C-141X only has 256 levels of pressure sensitivity while the Cintiq has 1024? Well, let me tell YOU something, wise guy. The distance over which these 256 levels are spread is tiny. I could move my pen over the monitor, TOUCHING it, and it won't register as a click just yet, because I'm not putting enough pressure on it. That's 0mm for it to register a click. Can you really gauge that difference? (Ok fine, I'm on a different TPC, but the digitizer's all Wacom anyways).

What's this again? Gateway's a crappy brand, you say? Gateway is best known for its cheap hardware, sure...but when you're buying a suck-ass $300 laptop,you can't expect anything but. This is a $1000 one. It's not going to explode at you.

Here's an FAQ (http://forum.tabletpcreview.com/showthread.php?t=11139) if you're interested. I use a Fujitsu TPC instead, so I can't answer specific questions about the model, but as for general tablet PC questions, I can do that.

[Mr. Moon]

Eh, good suggestion, although I doubt my mom would let me get a labtop... However, since that means I'd be able to take it with me and draw from place to place... I'll think about it.