After lurking around on the forums for a while I was wondering about people and their tablets. The current poll about tablets is about what kind of tablet they currently own. But as some stated in the poll they really wanted a larger one than they could afford.

So my question is: Does size matter, would the people with a 4x5 pad rather want a 6x8 or larger? Or did you chose 4x5 or whatever size for a reason?

As I am in the middle of the decisionmaking on getting an intous3 I wanted some input on what size would be best for photo retouching. Monitor size is 20" viewable. Resolution 1600x1200.

My 4x5 is more than enough for me. A friend bought the 6x8 and told me he should have gone with the 4x5 since it takes up less desk room and he never uses all the space anyway. But it all depends on your drawing style. I have no drawing style, so the smaller tablet works for me.

well when I draw by hand I use small movements, so I guess the 4x5 is good enough for me as well!

thanks

I have a 12x12 and wish I'd bought a 6x8.
I looked at the worn area (where the stylus scratches around most) and measured it to be roughly in a 6x8 inch area.

I have a Wacom Intuous 2 tablet and I don't use it as much as I used to. That pen makes my hand cramp nowadays.

It's probably worth noting monitor size and resolution.
----
Monitor size: 21"
Resolution: 1600x1200

I use the 4x5 with my laptop, but have 2 monitors on the desktop machine and that was to small for that, went to the 6x9, life is good!

Mike

How much of the tablet is used for moving the mouse around can be set in the control panel. If you have a large tablet and are only using a small area of it, then you probably have the display area set to "portion." Change it to "fit" and the entire active area of the tablet will correspond to the screen.

Set up like this, it then boils down to comfort. A larger tablet will cause you to move your arm more. So, if you like doing broad, sweeping strokes you have the room to do it. If you don't like moving around that much, then a smaller tablet will do nicely.

I like a large tablet with the display area set to FIT. The creates a 1 to 1 relationship between the tablet and the screen. The top left corner of the tablet is the top left of the screen. The center of the tablet is the center of the screen, etc. Once you get used to this relationship, clicking anywhere you want on screen becomes really easy and intuitive, not to mention extremely quick. I almost never use a mouse anymore... it's just too slow.

--Racc

Size is irrelevant, the only thing that's important is to feel comfortable with whatever you've chosen, and that comes with use. The more you use it, the more you'll feel comfortable with it.

Staying a bit on topic.

I was wondering if any of you have tried both the graphire 3 and intuos 3, and if you were able to feel any difference in the increased resolution and the higher number of pressure points the intuos has?

I have the Graphire 4x5, and the size seems perfectly adequate to me - and at the time it was all I could justify spending anyway. Having said that I do find it hard sometimes to perform certain mouse functions with it, because the sensitivity is so high (as the tablet is small) it makes it hard to move from one point to another accurately (eg. setting the compression rate in save to web and moving from one point to the next with the tablet can prove frustrating, as it involves such a small hand movement, and tends to jump instead from 65 to 68 etc very rapidly)

The other thing I have noticed is that the pen starts to hurt my finger after using it for some time, as it is just hard plastic - I don't know if the Intuous pens have a rubber grip?

One advantage to larger than 4x5 on the Intuos3 is you get two touchstrips, which (I believe) can be independently programmed.

Right now I've got a 12"x18" Intuos. I love it. But, as I've mentioned in the other tablet thread, I'm waiting for Wacom to start shipping the Cintiq 21UX.

It's a 21" tablet, with an LCD monitor built into it, so you use the stylus right on the screen. Wacom is having production and shipping difficulties. I've had my order in for quite some time now. I can't wait to get my hands on it.
It costs $2,500. Luckily work is paying for it.

--Racc