Graphics tablet for XX

[jriemerm]

Reading this thread one could get the idea that the Graphire is quite expensive. Unlike the other Wacom tablets, the Graphire runs for about &75, refurbs for close to $50. The Graphire also includes an electronic mouse with a scroll wheel, so it can be your only input device even if you prefer a mouse for certain tasks.

james

[Erik Heyninck]

Indeed, Graphire is not really expensive, and you get Painter Classic from C [img]/infopop/emoticons/icon_mad.gif[/img] with it. (This might be read by GuruGary)

I remember though that it is best not to leave the mouse on the tablet when you want to use your 'normal" mouse... [img]/infopop/emoticons/icon_cool.gif[/img]

[tomh]

Apart from price, the main difference between the Wacom Graphire and Wacom Intuous tablets is that the Intuous has twice as many pressure levels as the Graphire. This may not be important in XaraX since the support for graphics tablets is fairly limited. However, if you want to get into using Painter (a limited version comes free with Wacom tablets, but see the Painter Forum here for update options) the increased sensitivity of the Intuous makes an enormous difference. For example, doing pencil drawings with an Intuous tablet and Painter has the same tactile feel as the real thing. In fact, for clumsy oafs like me, drawing on the tablet can be adjusted to be more sensitive than a real pencil and paper.

If you do go the Wacom route (and I would recommend it), a thing you should be aware of is a problem with Windows 9x. There is a bug in the Windows Help support that interacts with the Wacom driver and can cause Help to fail in some packages. The obvious solution is for MS to fix it (no chance!). The practical solution is to only load the Wacom driver when you want to use the tablet.

[Erik Heyninck]

(theatrical voice): A bug in Windows? Impossible.

(normal voice): Thanks for mentioning. As I never expect help from Windows that goes any further than Dr.Watson who never seems to know what's going on, I never click help so I didn't notice the interaction...

[qmr]

bug in windows..?? of course always expect it, but here in Q~land the McMac G3 upstairs crashes more than even my win98 laptop. Whereas this NT thing powering my workstation here just keeps on going.

Wacom Intuos USB driver that came in the box (October last year) introduced a bug to my Thinkpad laptop (currently win98) which has stayed. An error message "hookdll.dll not initiated" or something equally irritable on bootup, and occasional sudden inability to type anything, even in Notepad sometimes. Lucky I'm not interested in IRC Chat or I'd be really ah upset. But I'm planning to replace it sometime soon with win2K so that'll fix it. Hell of a way to fix a driver bug though.

Q.

[Sean Sedwards]

It's worth checking out the Wacom site for new drivers (which are the same for Graphire and Intuos) as they publish regular updates. I haven't found any help bug, but a problem I had with Win95 DOS boxes was fixed by an update.

Regards - Sean