So @XPPen sent me their new pen display tablet to review! It’s the new Innovator 16 (https://xp-pen.com/product/638.html) with a 15.6 inch display.
Full review under cut with more pics!
First off my only regular use of this type of drawing on display is my 12.9 ipad for travel and the occasional go on a cintiq or yiynova in the past so im no expert with pen displays, I work with a wacom intuos pro on the daily.
image above shows everything they include in the box, they include a power block (and every converter) but if you have the USB space you can run it purely off your pc (2 USB and 1 HDMI port) which was so smooth and lass faffy then needing another plug.
side note i love the travel pen holder w/ nibs, it sucks when my pen gets dusty when i chuck it in a pencil case to travel.
The screen is really nice to work with its a 1920 x 1080 pixel size with a screen 13”9 x 7”10 with makes the ppi just over 140 which didn't make me feel like I could see every single pixel on the screen. I also liked the physical size, it didn't cramp my desk nor my drawing, my UI wasn’t 5 miles across the desk. They have actual stats about the colour profile on the product page but all i can say is the colours were loooooovveellyyyyy on my eyeballs.
The tooth on the screen is great, v similar to a paper texture ipad cover, the wheel supports two settings (one on the black (virtual), one on the outer silver (mechanical) and the buttons have notches and size differences to tell them apart under your fingers. (I dont use hotkeys on tablets, too many buttons to map and my intuos's are all taped up bc i kept spilling hot drinks on them while i worked, which i ALSO accidently did with this xp pen tablet with coffee and it survived!)
next thing is the size, this thing is /THIN/ its 9mm wide yet feels super solid and that's what really struck me when i first lifted it out of the box. I'm on Win 7 (I KNOW) Clip Studio and installation was a dream I just plugged it in to my pc, downloaded & installed the drivers, restarted once and I was good to go. (they said you should remove all other drivers before you install theirs but i forgot to uninstall wacom’s and it was fine, its unfortunately incompatible with wacom’s and you cant have pen pressure on both only the xp-pen when both are installed)
There's slightly more parallax on this than the ipad but wayyy less than older display tablets that i've used and it didnt get in the way of my drawing, also no lag that affected my drawing.
main con for me is the lightest pen pressure, it doesn't pick up the pen when you drag it across the surface of the screen using only its own weight pushing down unlike my intuos, this did affect my sketching since I work very lightly. (i'm only using the stand they provided here) (Video link to example of what i mean)
If you add a little bit of pressure it picks it up fine but it gave me the feeling like my pen was skipping the beginning of my strokes. The pen is a little lighter than the wacom one and this almost felt like it might be solved with a heavier pen? I got more used to this as I drew with it over the day and didn't affect my painting and it’s def something you could get used to over time.
I spent all day with it yesterday and rigged a somewhat ergonomic stand with the one they give you which is sturdy and travelable but not a good angle or height for long period of drawing (oh for the day tablet producers ship their products with good stands) I worked on it for about 8 hours and it never got hot.
Overall I'm really impressed with the tablet, it eliminates a lot of my past gripes with pen displays and I think if you like working with them, it's currently £449 ($499) in their stores which i think is great bang for your buck with this.
US: https://bit.ly/3eUWbax AU: https://bit.ly/3iAfiZY SEA: https://bit.ly/3gjfCdB UK: https://bit.ly/2ArL1v8 EU: https://bit.ly/2D5uZIg