Bamboo Tablet

[EIEIO]

I bought a Bamboo Create pen tablet for pattern work. The touch features seem to work maybe 20% of the time and the pen gets confused in Gimp. Trying to erase is lousy - if it does anything at all, it seems to erase based on pressure, so just swiping the eraser may partly erase from white or black to a dim grey. Some times the pen will not stay on Eraser, just switches to Pen.

Has anyone here gotten this thing to work acceptably in Gimp and Inkscape in WinXP? I tried my Win7 laptop but even their own tutorial won't load on that computer. I've been better able to work graphics with the tiny touch pad on my laptop. So far I'm ready to ship it back.

Any help out there?

[Old Crow]

I had problems with mine initially but overcame the problems by going to the Wacom website and downloading the updated driver. Works perfectly now.
Don R

[Intarsia92]

I've been using my Bamboo tablet and pen for the last several years with no problem, However I'm using it with Easy Draw software on a Mac computer.

[EIEIO]

Thanks for the input, but after several hours, removes, installs, updates, switch between Win7 and WinXP, and contact with their Tech Support, Wacom can kiss my tablet hello. It's on its way back home.

We should be past this point in computer hardware and software. In the 1980s we expected to struggle even with the ordinary, but not today. A business will easily waste double the cost of this unit (the Create was $164 on Amazon) with the end result likely being the same - drop kick it back to its maker.

Their tech support could only tell me that they cannot support Gimp or Inkscape because they are in the public domain. They suggested a new driver that did nothing (after updating I checked the Control Panel/System/Hardware/Device Manager/Driver and it was exactly the same as it was before the "update").

What drove me most nuts was that after rebooting the computer, the touch interface was pretty responsive for ~5 minutes. So if an IT guy was making the fix, he might see some working time and call it done. But after those 5 sweet minutes, it starts missing finger movements. It would not even drive its own tutorial in several places.

If you were looking for this as a device to improve your pattern making, and if you use a WinXP or Win7 computer, I'd suggest you look elsewhere. 

On the positive side, Amazon Prime delivered it for free, and is sending UPS tomorrow to pick it up for return. I like Amazon Prime and use it a lot.

[ShadowB6]

Sorry to hear of your Bamboo Tablet problems EIEIO. I had to do the same as DonR and download the newest drivers. Had you tried that? Mine wouldn't work until I had done that also. I run Windows 7 on my laptop and once I installed the latest drivers, it was like magic, it worked perfectly.

Mike

[Tomsunnu]

I am using since september of 2012 and so far have not encountered any issues accept intially the switch over from a mouse to bamboo was a bit difficult but now like Mike said it works like magic

Mahendra

[EIEIO]

I've found some neat tricks with Gimp that make the use of the small touch pad on my laptop much easier, so I can do w/o the tablet for now.

Note that it was a Bamboo Create on WinXP that gave me fits. Maybe other models on other OpSys work better.

[Keefie]

I'm saving for one of those tablets, so let me know if you get your problems sorted please.
Keith.

[IBMer]

Mine works ok.   I only hook it up when doing very detailed work.    My problem is that the touch pad on my laptop has always been flaky.  So the tablet helps in that area.

[EIEIO]

Mine works ok.   I only hook it up when doing very detailed work.    My problem is that the touch pad on my laptop has always been flaky.  So the tablet helps in that area.

WHAT HAVE YOU DONE WITH MINI-ME?