Is that normal for a new tablet? I've only had my Bamboo tablet for about a week now and it's got little hairline marks on the surface--lots of em. The surface is still pretty smooth but I'm wondering what it will look like by the end of the month. That might be normal because the nib is a little worn down and it seems to be leaving track marks. Oh well, it was only $65.

On a side note, it's really easy to draw with one of these things. I'm even faster with a stylus than with a pencil. I never have to sharpen the pencil or stop to erase anything. I've been drawing for more than 20 years and nobody ever told me about digital graphite before! I honestly didn't think anyone had designed a paint program to simulate charcoal, graphite, or chalk.

I have a bamboo, mine doesn't have any cracks, a smooth area from my stylus but no scratches. I found that if i went to Wal Mart and bought an 8$ case for an Ipad it will store it perfectly, it's even padded. I've had my pad for probably a year or so and other than one thin spot in the cable where a young overzealous rat bit into it it's help up perfectly.

Incidentally, I hope you enjoy yours as much as I enjoy mine. It's almost addictive and works in almost everything, although it is tricky to get to work with Inkscape sometimes. It was a little hard to get it to work in gimp at first (XP) but worked perfectly the first time in 7. If you don't already have it I really suggest that you get Mypaint. It's an amazing drawing package that works equally well in Windows and Linux. The only thing it doesn't provide is talent, of which I'm sadly lacking in. But still even with the talent of a cabbage I find it fun to draw with. I wish I had the artistic talent of Griatch and some of the other folks here. My talents are with words, fixing things, crying and burping babies, working with rats and dealing with bad guys. Sometimes i wish I could trade. It also works well with Artweaver, again, if you have some talent.

Some talent, some talent.... my kingdom for some talent.

Surely there's some kind of screen cover you can put over it... Not that I know, but it makes sense. If there isn't one, I call dibs on inventing it :P

I'm using Mypaint right now because it's the only paint program that works equally well in Vista and Linux as you mentioned. It's also the most amazing paint program I've ever come across. I'm sketching some stuff right now with it and if I'm feeling confident with the results I'll upload something by tonight. I can't get GIMP to work perfectly in Linux for some reason and I've tried everything. It's my first time with Linux though so that might be the problem.

I'm just pressing too hard or something with my new tablet. I think it's just normal wear and tear. You have to look real close under good lighting to notice the little marks on the pad. As I get comfortable with painting programs in general I'll switch over to GIMP to try my hand at special effects and stuff.

Oh, I forgot to ask you GMS... So you said you fight bad guys and deal with rats? What do you mean by that? Are you a super hero? Can you call forth swarms of rats on bad guys?

Mine is pretty scratched up, it's just the result of pressing hard. Note that I didn't say ``too hard.'' It shouldn't affect performance. You could, though, put a piece of smooth plastic (like a transparency) over the surface. Sometimes I put various types of drawing paper over the surface as well - just to change the feel. This might help with the nib wear-down as well. You could also change the pressure curve to get stronger lines with less touch. Those nibs can get expensive if you go through them fast.

I learned a neat trick where you can actually use weed-eater wire in place of a nib. I can't access the specifics to the tutorial, though.

You can adjust the presssure etc rom your control panel in windows. I haven't used my bamboo in Linux yet but i'm sure here is a way. You might want to have a look at artrage too. It's very good too but isn't free.

no, my rats would never been much on attacking anything. I have about 35 of them and seem to have a knack for working with them when most other people can't. most people who know me know that they're my favorite pet and i prefer them to some people. As for the bad guys thing. I have a talent for dealing with bullies and the like.

I got mine - bamboo fun - used. I think I read that there was supposed to be a 'film' that you placed on the surface, however nothing like that was found in my package.
I generally place piece of stiff paper or a bit of plastic depending on whether I am using the mouse of the pen.

byw, how was your experience with installing the software as suggested from this thread ?

My HanWang tablet actually came with a thin film over the screen(like your new phone usually has).
I leave that on.
I think any plastic wrap will work as long as you take out the air bubbles.

Cecilia: I didn't completely reinstall Linux because it was going to create a new partition on my hard drive or either completely erase my copy of Linux. I would have had 3 operating systems and two copies of Linux on my machine. I never had to install any thing from Wacom to get my tablet working in Linux. It works fine except for GIMP and I think it might have something to do with this new release of Linux Mint that I installed. Maybe they haven't worked out all the kinks yet because I know they work closely with Wacom to make sure they have compatible drivers for tablets.

I'm going to stick with Vista until they fix the issue in Linux Mint.

You wouldn't have to install it in linux, it would do it automatically. But you probably know that already.

Perhaps you need to replace your stylus tip.

Griatch's Nib tutorial
I would check that out, and if there is anyone who has lots of digipainting experience , it's griatch

I never have replaced mine, i just pull it out and rotate it a little. That way it gets equal wear. but then maybe I'm just cheap.

ah, I see....the tablet seems to work ok for me in Ubuntu 10.04 although there are some tools that it Insists I only use the pen and not the mouse.....but that's ok by me.