I bought a Wacom Intuos3 6″x8″ pen based tablet a about a month ago and boy what a difference it makes.
Over the years of GUI computing, the mouse has been the main input pointing device. It has never been all that comfortable and some have injured their wrists over prolong use of mice. Other input pointing devices have always been available with the trackball being a far second most common input pointing device behind the mouse. While some trackball user friends have been saying the trackball it is the ultimate input pointing device for precision and comfort, I am not all that convinced. While tablets have also been available, they have not been the main stream input pointing device among consumer market as their cousin the digitizer to the CAD/CAM professionals.
The Intuos3 is a pen based tablet that comes in 9″x12″, 6″x8″, and 4″x5″ three sizes. They can be programmed to point at the relative screen position like a mouse does where one could remove the mouse off and reposition the mouse on the table without changing its screen pointing position for small desk space movements, or to point at the absolute position where a point on the tablet is always fixed to the same position on screen. While it has many optional purchased pen tips including a spray pen option, it also has a mouse option which maybe intended for being used as a digitizer.
Originally, I was thinking the 9″x12″ being the largest one and therefore having the most precise pointing ability would be the best one to use. However, after consulting with Roy, my graphic designer friend who had also bought the 6″x8″ model at the same time with me, he mentioned that the 9″x12″ model being used with the absolute positioning mode would be way too much of a hand/arm travel from one conner of the screen to another making it very difficult to use. After using the 6″x8″ for a few weeks, while it sped up and made easy of photo image manipulation dramatically, I have come to realize theat maybe the 4″x5″ model with even less hand/arm travel would make it even more convenient to use. Not to mention the smaller size would keep the laptop screen not as far from the user as a large one would.
The Intuos3 don’t come cheap but Roy said the Intuos3 certainly beats all the other pen based tablets he had ever used, including the Wacom Graphire3 which is Wacom’s lower model, and none other that he likes at all by a landslide. I also like the Intuo3 so much that I am considering getting a 4″X5″ model as well – one for home and one for work.
WhaUSay?!