Wacom Bamboo Splash Pen Tablet (CTL471)

I purchased this item because I thought it would allow me to draw on my computer. This is an amazing device as far as the technology goes, but I have no use for it and am still using my mouse to draw. You move the cursor on the screen by moving the tip over the tablet without actually touching the tip to the tablet. It needs to be close to the tablet without touching. Within 1 centimeters (the width of the pen itself). When you touch the tip to the tablet it is equivalent to pressing the mouse button. And it draws. When you click on the button on the side of the pen it is equivalent to clicking the right mouse button. The button on the side of the pen is actually two buttons. It is a tall button with the top being one button and the bottom being a separate button. You could change the function of the side buttons on the setup menu. The main problem is the awkwardness of using this device to draw. There's an annoying distraction of having to maintain that 0 to 1 centimeter distance without actually touching the tip to the tablet. It it touches, it will draw. If it is too far, the cursor won't move. It would be best if you can just draw on the display screen, which is a very expensive system. With this tablet you're watching the display screen without able to see the pen tip, which is what you're already doing if you just use the mouse to draw. But when using the mouse you don't have to worry about keeping the tip close to the surface without touching. The mouse is so much more easier because it doesn't have that distraction of having to maintain the proper tip to tablet distance. A big thing missing is the lack of touch mode. You can't use your finger to move the cursor. Only the pen tip can move the cursor. And so without touch mode the two-finger pinch and resize function does not work. The eraser button also does not work. The eraser at the end of the pen is just a piece of plastic. It is not a button. For it to have any function there needs to be a touch mode on the tablet. The more expensive Wacom tablets have touch mode, but this tablet does not. For this tablet to be functional for drawing, you should be able to turn off the tip button. You should be able to move the cursor without having to worry about accidentally drawing if the tip touches the tablet. And then you would configure the side button to draw when the side button is pressed. There is nothing in the setup or options windows that allow you to turn off the tip button. And so I am back to drawing with my mouse. PROBLEM SOLVED UPDATE: I fixed my Bamboo Splash so I don't have to worry about maintaining the 0 to 1 centimeter distance. I disabled the tip button by simply removing the tip. If you gently pull the tip out with tweezers or a pair of pliers the tip will slide out. It does not damage the device since this is the normal procedure for replacing the nib and you can easily just slide it back in. And then you go to the setup preferences menu and assign the two side buttons to be in the "click" mode. Now you can move the cursor from 1 centimeter to touching the tablet and it will not draw. And then you can draw just by pressing the side button while moving the pen. Now the Bamboo is EASIER to draw than the mouse!

Yes, maybe this being my first experience is biasing my opinion somewhat, but I just got this Bamboo Splash yesterday and am loving it. Drawings were initially very tough for me, and at the default settings of the software the pad seems extremely sensitive. I believe this is a common problem and seems to be the reason for a lot of the 1 star reviews. The problem in my case is the result of having a dual monitor setup, the software defaults to mapping the the pad to span both monitors. The solution was a simple tweak to the pen settings to map to only one monitor. When using the pen outside of drawing again the settings need to be reset because unlike some other models of the Bamboo, the pen included for Splash does not have buttons to allow toggling between settings. As far as navigating around my computer the pen is fine and I am starting to like it more than the trac ball I was using that I like more the standard mouse. I do sort of miss the back button being a convenient hardware key-click away, but those with standard mice would not even know what I am talking about. (Update)- After about a month of use, I'm finding that using the pen as an input device has the drawback of it being difficult to drag-and-drop items or to highlight blocks of text, I still use the trac-ball for that. The model of this device that works as a touchpad could possibly be a solution to this problem, however I am not tempted to upgrade because, reading through the reviews, it looks like there are issues with using that model to perform the double-duty of pen and touchpad input. -(end of update) The software that came packaged, Artrage 3 (with a discount to buy version 4) is an inexpensive package to start with, but not to look a gift horse in the mouth, I am finding it a good piece of software to learn to use the pen on. I usually use GIMP for the few times I work with graphics, and I found Artrage very intuitive, although an understanding of layering is a good thing to know. It also comes with Autodesk Sketchbook Express, that if I'm not wrong may be free anyway, but is another nice drawing tool. I had a few problems during installation. When I first plugged the tablet in my Windows 7 machine I received a message stating the driver was found and when I tried I was able to move the cursor around. So I proceeded by starting the install exe and was brought through the video users guide (the hardcopy quickstart guide said this would happen). The problem was that the pen was no longer working so I couldn't take the interactive training. I had to go to the Wacom Bamboo website and reload the driver. But after that and a little bit of annoyance with products keys and registrations to get the Artrage program, it's been nothing but fun!

I had wanted a drawing tablet for many years, although for one reason or another I never purchased one. However, after purchasing Wacom's Bamboo Splash Pen Tablet, I regret not having purchased one sooner. Using it is completely intuitive; hovering above the tablet (a couple of centimeters) moves the cursor around, tapping clicks, while double tapping double clicks (although moving too far from the initial click cancels the double click,) a small amount of pressure usually creates lighter and or thinner lines, while more pressure creates wider and or darker lines (depending on the brush and program you're using.) Keep in mind, I've had this for about a week so I can't really speak for its performance in the long term but I will most likely post an update after six months, sooner if anything goes wrong. I dislike using Windows and Mac OSes, so I can't say anything about the software included with the tablet. I've been using Inkscape (vector graphics software), GIMP (raster graphics software), Mypaint (raster graphics software with brushes that mimic traditional mediums such as sketching pencils, paintbrushes, oil sticks and others), and Aseprite (sprite/animation software) all of which are free and open source. I'm using Arch Linux (x86_64) and installed the drivers by installing libwacom and xf86-input-wacom. I was able to use the tablet as soon as they were done installing with the complete pressure sensitivity. It's set up by default to utilize absolute pointing (the top left of the tablet is the top left of the screen vs relative, which is like a laptop's touchpad.) I don't have a need to change it to a relative pointer, so I haven't looked into where the settings to change that would be located. Before purchasing the tablet, I read several reviews in different places where people had qualms about the nibs wearing down. Although it makes sense that they would wear down, since the nib would need to be softer than the tablet to prevent the tablet wearing down too easily or much worse, ending up with scratches in the tablet surface. A few replacement nibs are included with the tablet and I would much rather replace cheap nibs than a whole tablet. Going back to the title of this review. If you're interested in this tablet, and you've read this much I think you should purchase this tablet. It's fun and easy to use. If you have a problem with the bottom of the pen not being an eraser, you can always map one of the buttons to either undo or to change brush, that way undo is just a click away, or all of your brushes would appear under the cursor, at least that's how a respectable program does things (Mypaint.) In firefox, the button closest to the nib acts like a middle click and the button furthest from the nib is right click. In Mypaint, the button closest to the nib is button 2 and the furthest one from the nib is button 3, if that helps anyone. But I digress, the only reason why you wouldn't want this tablet is because you want a more expensive model. Why would you want a more expensive model? If you want a larger surface area (do they make them larger? I imagine so. I haven't had any problems with running out of room, that's what zoom is for) or if you want more features, such as tilt sensitivity or perhaps even more pressure sensitivity. Maybe those are features that you don't realize you needed until you use them because not having extra features hasn't been a problem. At this price (it's one new game or a few cups of large coffee) you can't really go wrong; you get an amazing, very responsive, and entertaining product. Update (August 8, 2013) Maybe I should have mentioned that I don't use "modern" (bloated) window managers like gnome or kde. I use i3wm, the most amazing and wonderful window manager ever (paired with dmenu and i3status), so I didn't know that gnome has a wacom control icon in its control panel. You can switch between left/right handed, not sure what that would do, exactly. Maybe it would make a difference on a more expensive model with buttons on the tablet. From this control panel thingy, you can easily switch between relative and absolute pointing methods. You can also change which buttons the buttons are mapped to (e.g. change the bottom button to right click, top to middle click or something) and you can also change the pressure 'feel' from this control panel link. If you prefer not to use a window manager with a wacom control built into the control panel, you can easily (kind of) change the absolute/relative setting withing /etc/X11/xorg.conf or the /etc/X11/xorg.conf.d/ files. The Arch Linux's wiki "Wacom Tablet" entry provides updated information on how to change those settings. I should have provided lsusb and xsetwacom info for Wacom CTL-470 earlier but I didn't. Sorry. Better late than never, right? "lsusb" output: Bus 004 Device 002: ID 056a:00dd Wacom Co., Ltd Bamboo Pen (CTL-470) "xsetwacom --list-devices" output: Wacom Bamboo Connect Pen stylus id: 12 type: STYLUS Wacom Bamboo Connect Pen eraser id: 13 type: ERASER Wacom Bamboo Connect Finger touch id: 14 type: TOUCH Wacom Bamboo Connect Finger pad id: 15 type: PAD The output of xsetwacom was very interesting. It kind of makes me wonder if all Wacom tablets can use the pens with the 'eraser' tip but maybe Wacom doesn't install the tip to give its customers a reason to buy a more expensive tablet, hmmm... If I had money to burn, or another tablet with a pen that had the eraser, I'd test this but since I don't, I'll just leave this out there. The tablet still doesn't have any scratches, even though I've left it on the floor next to the bed (to play with it on the laptop) and I also kind of tripped, stepped on the tablet while it was resting on top of a shoe, I didn't put all of my weight, maybe about 30% of it onto the tablet and nothing happened to it. maybe a newer, thinner tablet would have broken, but the tablet is almost like new (except for some hair-width scratches on the shiny bit of plastic that says bamboo, but that's not part of the drawing surface). The nibs do wear out sooner than anticipated but, in Wacom's defence, I am heavy-handed (there's also the aforementioned reasons prior to the update). TLDR: I like it, it works with linux, it's well built, the included software are toys (mypaint, krita, inkscape, gimp are far superior and all free/open source). Also, you can rotate the canvas in mypaint and krita -squeee-!

I'm going to go straight to the point here: Pros: Packaging was wonderful. It came in a recycled box that was well protected by air packets. When the product was shipping, I'm always worried about what will happen to my product, but I say don't worry. Like I said, the packaging was superb. The Wacom Splash CTL471 is a very good tablet for beginners. I love the wireless pen, for once I'm allowed to be worry-free about when my pen battery will die. The tablet is sleek and I can easily fit it into my laptop case. It's a beautiful black and green, and OH, I LOVE THE COLOR! The installation process was SO easy. Just be sure to read the manual before you start any instillation so you can see what to do. My tablet came with Autodesk Sketchbook Pro 2011, and I'm LOVING IT!!! The tools are wonderful and layers are so easy to add to my artwork. It also came with ArtRage studio 3, which is also wonderful, and has a wide variety of tools that come with it. I'm now learning to use these two programs with my paintool sai, and I will definitely be using all of these wonderful programs. The tablet came with extra tips and there is a explanation on how to change the nibs, which didn't come with my other tablet (and left me to freak out and wonder how the hell was I supposed to change the tip XD). Now the cons: I've had this product for a month now, and I've already noticed the tip of the pen already starting to sand down. The product did come with extra nibs, but what will happen when I run out? So I went to the Wacom website to see if I can order some extra nibs. ( I also thought the same thing about the pen: What will happen if the pen breaks?) Now this little detail almost made me return the product, BUT I really needed the tablet, so I kept it. When I went on the Wacom website, I only found out they sold the tips for this pen. BUT, I could NOT find the pen. The CTL471 is a slightly older model, and they don't sell the pens anymore. So what if you drop your pen and a button breaks? Or your dog decides to bury it in the yard? Well, the answer is, you're going to have to buy a new tablet. Which worries me, but a friend of mine is giving me his new bamboo fun that he had received as a present, (but he doesn't draw XD), so That is just the only light to my sad story. I'm going to call Wacom on monday so I can see if there IS anyway to buy the pen. So I have my fingers crossed. Another con is the next generation od this product (the CTL461 I believe... just go on the wacom website, and go to the bamboo section of their products) has a TOUCHSCREEN (which you can also use a pen with)!! Which this model does not have. The moment I found this out, I was SOOO angry, because this would eliminate the problem with the pen! That and you have more control on what's on your canvas. But *sigh* there's nothing I can do, unless I return this and save up more money for the newer model, but like I said I need this tablet now (but I REALLY RECOMMEND BUYING THE NEWER MODEL INSTEAD OF THIS!!!). There is also a lag that I'm faced with. It makes writing names or signatures annoying, because It will suddenly stop. Now the last con is the pressure control. Not all of use have photoshop or a fancy drawing program. I currently use paintool sai, and with my older (much crappier) tablet, I didn't have this problem. On this Wacom Bamboo tablet, every line is just that, a line. No matter how I change the settings on paintool sai or on the tablet pen itself, it's just a line. I'm a manga artist and having bland lines for everything is a nono. I've been trying to set it up to where the harder I press, the thicker the line will become, and the more sharp it will be, but no. I've tried everything, and I've been getting nowhere. Maybe there was a piece of the software I didn't get? I don't know. But It's been very aggravating for me. As stated, this is a WONDERFUL tablet for beginners, but for more intermediate/advanced artists, I wouldn't recommend this unless it's for traveling, or for a trip and you want portability, not really exact work. And so I give this 3 out of 5 stars.

Pros - The pen is sleek, I enjoy the software. The pad for the tablet is a good size, and right-left hand adjustable. The levels of sensitivity is has is more than enough for what I do currently, but I'll likely have to be buying a more professional one when I start my more advanced classes. This is a great hobby pen, and the nubs are great. Cons- On the item, it said it was the CTL470, although the serial number confirmed that it was the CTL471 (as did its appearance.) Although the work area is listed in its specifications, when the tablet itself came I was surprised by how much dead space on the side there was. Sometimes the tablet gets really sensitive and will start highlighting or scrolling. This is my third tablet. It's much much better than the Bamboo Fun, which I went through two of due to carelessness. It's sturdy and great for a hobby. It's inexpensive and works well, and its little quirks are easy to learn and maneuver through. The programs are just an added bonus, but I really like the Sketchbook program when I'm just fiddling around.

This review is for the Splash Pen Tablet (CTL471), the so-called, "entry-level" tablet for artists and the like. I got this mainly because I'm a past Wacom tablet user (the Graphire 4 and, before that, the PenPartner), so I went with what works based upon past experience. I am just an image-editing enthusiast with a penchant for creating art. I was already aware that this tablet's pen does not have an "eraser" end, which isn't a deal-breaker. It's not that hard to hit the eraser shortcut. I just wanted a functional tablet mostly for use in Photoshop Elements (which does not come with this version of the tablet; the Create and above has it). The package comes with a CD that contains the software key on the back of its case for downloading ArtRage 3 Studio (a "lighter" version of ArtRage 3 Studio Pro) and Autodesk Sketchbook Express 2011. I would highly recommend checking them out. You can upgrade to ArtRage 4 for half the price you would pay for a full version. The package also contains an offer for an 8x10 metal print from imagecom.com and an offer for TechSmith's Snagit screen capturing software. The tablet has a woven (vinyl?) loop on the side to hold the pen when not in use. My only gripes: -The micro USB-to-USB cable that comes with the tablet detaches, which is a plus, because the cable's length is horrendously short at only 3 feet long. If you plan on getting your own cable, make sure it's a micro-USB to USB cable and that the boot on the micro USB end is small enough as the micro USB connector on the tablet is recessed in a bit. -Because of the new surface Wacom uses (both on this line of tablets and their professional Intuos line), pen nib wear can be a problem, even if you use the lightest of pressure. It's about $5 for 5 nibs straight from Wacom and you can wear one down within just a couple hours. You do the math. I really like the new surface but not at the cost of sinking money into constant nib replacements. The problem can be rectified by buying a surface cover from POSRUS specifically for this tablet. It basically mimics the old surfaces Wacom used to use (translated as, "not as nib-eating"). Those are my only gripes. Other than that, the performance of the tablet is spectacular. I was able to jump right into Photoshop Elements and do my usual cloning on old photos and artistic tasks with aplomb. (How awesome is it that you can create a layer mask and adjust opacity just by how hard/soft you press with the pen?) That alone deserves 5 stars even with the quirks. Highly recommended.

I previously ordered a turcom tablet which failed to work with my computer unfortunately. Having had good experience with bamboo tablets before, I ordered this one. It came within 4 days of ordering with everything intact. It is refurbished but I had no troubles installing the drivers and immediately starting to use the tablet. Not a lot of levels of sensitivity but boy is this a great tablet! I love how the pen does not require any batteries. The nibs wear out fairly quick but you can save yourself a lot of money by not buying the overpriced nibs and instead buying .065 thick weed whacker wire, the plastic wire that goes on weed whackers (DONT GET THE STAR SHAPED KIND, ONLY THE ROUND ONE). it fits the pen a bit loose but it works just fine with my pen and I save myself a lot of money! The programs that came with it are pretty good too! I love art rage and I've had nothing but good experience with it! Sketchbook express I was not too fond of. Do yourself a favor and get a better micro usb cable for it too. The cable it comes with is terrible and too thin and short. it lasted me only half a month. Other than that, if you need a good starter tablet for digital art or to use to edit your photos in photoshop with precision, this tablet is the way to go!

I didn't want much out of this. I just wanted something that could translate a simple drawing, like, say, a circle, to the screen. Sure, I hoped for a bit more--to actually be able to draw with the damned thing--but I was keeping my expectations low. And even with that, boy oh boy did the Splash disappoint. It's rubbish is what I'm getting at. It's a drawing tablet so, basically, the only thing it needs to do is translate the pen's movement on the touch pad to the screen. Seems simple enough, touchscreen technology has been around for decades now. The problem with the Splash (and other drawing tablets, I imagine) is that computer displays are nonstandard. With touchscreens on laptops, tablets, or Nintendos, the technology only ever needs to work with a screen of specific size and resolution. With PCs, the tech has to work on every resolution from 400 x 600 to 1920 x 1080, at ever size monitor from 11" to 32" and so on. You can probably see where I'm going with this, right? For a PC drawing tablet like the Wacom Splash, functionality is as dependent on software as hardware, if not more so. Users need to be able to tweak the touch settings to fit the size of their displays, else all they'd have would be a smoldering heap of refuse. So what's the Splash's problem? The software stinks. There are very few options to tweak sensitivity or screen area or pointer speed, and those options that are there are extremely limited. My specific problem was that I have a large monitor. 27" big. That makes the vertical height about 14". The Splash's touch screen is about the size of an index card. I could either set the Bamboo Pen to "pen mode" or "mouse mode." Setting it to pen mode gave me two usage options. First, I could operate with the touch-pad effecting the entire monitor space. That meant that moving the stylus from the bottom to top of the touch pad would move the cursor on-screen from the very bottom to the very top. That would probably be really bad, but in reality it was worse: moving the pen 1" on the touch pad would move the cursor the whole way from top to bottom. What that means, in a nutshell, is that for ever 1 unit of vertical movement I input via the pen, the cursor on screen moves 14 units vertically. That's a 1,400% difference! That made even the most basic of precision drawing tasks--like drawing a goddamned circle--impossible and oh-so-very frustrating. And "pen mode" offered a second setting--to portion the screen area affected by the touch pad. Sounds like a good idea, right? Well, draw a random square in the middle of your screen and imagine that your cursor can only ever affect things within that square... yeah. So while it's entirely possible to get the pen operation on a 1:1 motion capture, doing so dramatically decreases the usable area of the screen to the point where there's really no point in bothering with the touch pad and pen at all. So, if pen mode is a godawful, unusable mess, what about mouse mode? IT STINKS! Did I surprise you? It's even worse then pen mode. Two big problems here: first, the touch pad will register the pen (and affect cursor movement) even when the pen is not touching the pad. (So... does that mean this isn't even a touch pad at all?). Mouse movement will be registered with the pen as far away from the pad as 1.5". So using it in mouse mode means constantly removing your entire arm from the pad just to perform basic maneuvers. But, okay, that's not a deal-breaking issue. The deal breaking issue? Lack of sensitivity and cursor speed options. Again, the issue here is poor motion capture ratios. Moving the pen a centimeter on the pad moves the cursor several inches on the screen. So, right: terrible software. Sure, though, if the problem is that the touch pad is too sensitive and set up so that minute finger movements register as much larger cursor movements, the hardware itself must be quite good, right? Just imagine all those small details of movement that it captures! Well, think again. The touch pad captures movement with less accuracy that your average $10 mouse. A simple circular movement will be read as a wiggle, circles will be read as straight lines, oh--and did I mention lag? Yeah, sometimes (or, rather, quite often) there can be a delay of several seconds before the actual cursor moves on-screen in response to your input via the pen. Yikes. I'll mention, for the record, that I'm operating this pen on a Windows 7 x64 PC, with all of the latest drivers installed, and have practiced with the pen (trying oh-so-very hard to get it working well) on the bundled software, MS Paint, Adobe Photoshop and Adobe Illustrator. Given the nature of the problems I've had with the Splash, however, I imagine the average user experience will be quite similar to my own regardless of PC specs, and can only attribute the relatively high reviews this product has received to an overwhelming number of people with evidently unfathomably low standards. So, to sum up: it's worthless. Don't buy it, you'll regret it, and the time you spend struggling to get it working with some semblance of functionality is time you will never get back.