Graphics tablets

[caraman1]

That sounds great!

On an unrelated note. The Graphire now comes with PhotoShop LE along with Painter classic. If you bought the Graphire after Aug 15th, they'll send you a free updated CD

Dennis [img]/infopop/emoticons/icon_eek.gif[/img]

<a href=http://www.inconnect.com/~dennisco/>Carillus Design</a>

[Sean Sedwards]

I've finally taken delivery of a serial Graphire and so far I'm very impressed. My initial thoughts are as follows:

Why serial? Wacom told me there was no difference in performance and I wanted compatibility with non USB hardware. Note, however, that you require a 9 pin serial port and a PS/2 connection to provide the 'power'.

The pen is excellent, even for general use, and really comes into its own with Satori and Painter. The subtlety and control of movement is phenomenal compared to a mouse and brings new life to simple bitmap apps. like PSP. The Graphire mouse also works well but its 'speed' characteristics may take some getting used to.

'Mouse mode' (drag mouse, lift and drag some more) is slow but should allow you to play games. There's a speed adjustment via the control panel but it mostly varies the 'acceleration' (cursor moves more if you move the mouse faster). This partially solves the problem and may work well with games, however it can create new difficulties. E.g. if you move the cursor fast to one side of the screen, select an object then try to move it to the other side slowly, you may run out of pad and have to lift the mouse while holding down the button. Wacom say the acceleration will be adjustable in the next version of the driver.

'Pen mode' (pad is mapped to screen) allows you to set up the ratio of pen / mouse movement to cursor movement and overcomes the above problem to an extent, although it doesn't feel entirely natural if you're used to a mouse. This may change with familiarity.

One of the best features of the Graphire is the ability for either tool (pen or mouse) to work in either mode (pen mode or mouse mode) and for the settings to be customised per application. Hence you could have the mouse set up to use a fast mouse mode for Quake, pen mode for Xara and a medium mouse mode for general use, say.

Existing users may be interested to note that although the "Add Tool to List..." button seems permanently greyed, the software automatically detects a new tool placed on the pad and adds it to the list (you can see this happen if you install the Graphire with no tools on the pad, open the Control Panel applet and place the mouse on the pad). Hence the possibility of Intuos-style multiple tools is not ruled out.


Regards - Sean