Genius MousePen 8 x 6-Inch Graphic Tablet for Home and Office

This is an excellent little device. First off, some corrections and suggestions: The device I got came with 42 hot cells. 13, however were unmarked. They are there, however. Just use the other cells to gauge where they should be (there are 13 top cells as well, so they're in the same positions.) [Edit] As you will see in the following paragraphs, I was very excited about the hot cells, because I thought I could replace the many functions I use my keyboard for with those cells. Unfortunately, you have to look away from the screen to see them (which is impossible in the dark unless you put some sort of glow sticker on them). Therefore, keeping my keyboard on my left side has been much more efficient, because I can navigate by touch without taking my eyes off the screen. Note also, however, that I was already very practiced at using only my left hand to execute commands when I used a mouse. It's much faster, also, to simply choose tools from the toolbar (or use the already programmed keyboard shortcuts) than using a hot cell, and to make easy keyboard shortcuts for actions. [End Edit] The pen doesn't have an eraser, but, at least in Photoshop, a hardware eraser would be pointless. Make an action mapped to a function key that changes your tool to eraser, map it to your tablet hot cell, and you're good to go (It's FASTER than flipping the pencil around.) Don't know how? Here's a quick run-through (this is on PS7... other versions shouldn't be a lot different): Window->Action (Check it, if it's already checked uncheck and check it so you can see the action pallete) Click the action pallete, you can probably delete anything that's already there, but you don't need to. Click the create new button at the bottom of the pallete (notepad icon), name it and set it to whatever button combination you want (I think it has all th e function keys +shift+ctrl, so that's plenty of combinations) Hit the record button on the bottom of the pallete, then click the eraser tool. You'll see "Select Eraser" appear in the action pallete. Press Stop. Now in the system tray, click the icon that has a pen drawing on a tablet. Go to hot cells. Click whichever cell you want to make the eraser, name it Eraser, then click define. A menu will pop up, Select Hotkeys: check the ctrl or shift buttons if you used them in your combination, and then choose the correct function button. Then click OK/Apply and your done. Now any time you tap in that cell you select the eraser. With actions, you can also change the brush type, size, opacity, and what pen pressure does, if you want. They're very powerful for streamlining your projects, especially if you end up doing a lot of the same things to every image. With hot cells, it's even faster (though I wish they would ship with blank labels, but I'll get some.) Next, points about pen pressure not working/etc. All the solutions have already been offered. Download the updated driver (I am using this on Vista 64 with no problems. A new driver was issued Jan 15 specifically for Vista 64.) It apparently addressed CS4 issues as as well, but I don't have that to comment. Run the set-up from the zip file on their site, and you'll be good to go (it may take a couple of minutes.. my computer's fairly fast and it still took awhile. During that time it said it was "not responding" but it was actually installing the driver. Don't trust Windows... Reboot. Anyway, next, change the battery. I use rechargeable batteries in all of my wireless stuff, anyway, so it wasn't a big deal. The pen was working before I did this in mine, as well. Finally, check your photoshop brush pallete and make sure you've got it set right. Opacity is in other options, Size is in Shape Manipulation. Those are the only two I foresee using "Pen Pressure" to control. Now, if you're using size, your MAX pressure equals the brush size you select. It won't go bigger than that. So pick the biggest you want it to get, and learn the pressure to get it as small as you want. It takes some getting used to. With opacity it's the same thing, use the highest opacity you want to get to on a single stroke. Another con, the New and Open Hot Cells (which are labeled on the tablet) were reversed on mine. it took all of two seconds to fix, though. (switch the ctrl+o and ctrl+n definitons to the other). Alright, enough of that. The tablet is great. 8x6 is plenty of room, and the texture is nice. Whoever said it was sandpaper is nuts, or they've upgraded the hardware. feels very close to drawing in my sketchbook. I really like it. The pressure sensitivity works well, though I would have preferred some way to have the very lightest pressure be just making contact with the tablet (and not pressing down at all). This is how I do light shading with pencil, and it's a lot more comfortable for me. Adjustments have to be made for the convenience of digital medium, though. Oh, uh... I haven't even taken the mouse out of the bag. I already have a wireless keyboard with touchpad that works great, and then pen works well as a mouse, too. This IS set in absolute mode. I haven't found anyway to make the cursor position the center of the tablet, which really would have been nice (mark the center point with a line and position it with a mouse when you need to be exact.) Hovering works... but basically you just have to memorize how things on screen relate to the pad. I'm sure it will become second nature eventually, but it's a pain right now. The transition is difficult enough from not using hand-eye coordination to draw. [Edit] I now much prefer having it in absolute mode, where the center of the tablet is always the center of the screen. With some practice, I'm now able to reasonably predict the area where I'm going to draw without even looking at the pad. Beware turning the pad at a different angle to your screen :-)[End Edit] Let's see... I think that's it for now. I'll try it in ubuntu 8.10 eventually, and update. From the reviews it seems GIMP works well with it, so that should be interesting. [Edit] Works great on Ubuntu, although it's not fully functional. I couldn't get the pressure working, though I didn't try long. I got along without pressure for a long time :-). I'm very happy with this purchase, and would likely pay twice what I did for it again, which says quite a lot. [End Edit]

Wow. This is my first review on Amazon ever. I'll try to make it good. I recently started a big project. I needed a tablet because I wanted to be able to write directly into a paint program and use the resulting image. A mouse would make this exceedingly difficult. I did a lot of research and since this isn't a major part of my project, I just wanted something simple and cost effective. I debated between this and the Wacom Fun Tablet and the Wacom Small Tablet. This one was cheaper and seemed to be able to do the job, so I got it. I was worried as to whether it would be compatible with my MacBook Pro though. It was. It states its Mac compatibility on the box that you receive, but here in the Amazon reviews it's confusing (at least I wasn't sure if it would be). It works. Just follow the instructions as another reviewer said: download the driver first; restart the computer; then, plug in the MousePen; if it doesn't work, take it out and plug it in again (that's what I had to do; no big deal). What I found is that this is great for me and probably others who want to do something similar; it's a basic tool that will let you write or draw and do it well for the price. I just got it but wanted to write a review because I didn't feel other reviews made it clear whether or not it really worked for a Mac and that it is a good product. Some points worth noting: -You can adjust the pressure. It can become pretty sensitive, so you shouldn't have any trouble making fine lines at all (just make sure that [as the previous reviewer stated] you set the brush for a big setting on your paint program so touching the pen lightly to the pad will bring out a clean line). -You can change the "Hot-Cells" around easily to open different programs; this is really nice and convenient. -You can adjust the size that corresponds to the screen, so moving the pen across the tablet can either move your mouse across the whole screen or move your mouse across about half of the screen. -But, it's not an awesome replacement for a mouse or a touchpad. I wouldn't use it to navigate around, just write and draw. I know, I know; basic stuff, but this is my first tablet and I would have liked to have known this (and maybe you might want to know it as well). The only negative point that might be worth mentioning is that it doesn't have a "touchpad" function as some of the Wacoms do, so you can't use your fingers to move around also. I would have never guessed this, but as you're working with the pad, it's something you want to have. Even though reviewers berated the touch function of the Wacom and other tablets, it's probably worth it if you're a more serious user and don't mind the extra bucks. That's why I gave this product a 4 and not a 5: for the price, ease of use, functionality, but missing touchpad function (that would have made this incredible). Now, my final comment is that I'm pretty happy with my purchase and if you're in a similar situation (need to draw or write easily), I'm pretty confident you will be too. Just my opinion and experience. I hope it helps :) Again, recommended.

Alright, I waited a full month before doing this review because I wanted to make sure I was testing what the product really was, and not what it started off being. Overall, this Genius tablet has been working great and has been a great asset to my digital drawing. Also, for those who say that it doesn't work well with Windows 7 I ask: Have you downloaded the add-on off of [...]? If not, there's your problem. Now for some specifics. Sensitivity: This tablet is very good. You can set the sensitivity, and other features, quite easily. Sure, sometimes the sensitivity came off and on, but it eventually went away through weeks of tweaking the settings (if you have the same problem, wait for a week or two and it should go away). Now, the tablet's sensitivity is working just great! For those who say that the tablet has dead-spots, please skip over to my section on "Battery" because, unless it is truly the pressure sensitive area that has the problem, it is the pen's battery. Size: I don't know why people would want a bigger size, or a smaller size for that matter, because the 8"x6" tablet is a really good size to start on. In reality, the tablet is much bigger than I had anticipated. Pen: What can I say? It's a good pen. The buttons are good, the feel is good,and the pen tip is quite good as well. Now, if only they had a grip for that thing for when I draw for more than one hour at a time... that would be great. Battery: Now, I have read plenty of reviews that said that the batteries that came with the tablet were a bunch of bologna. I took that advice, got a battery from my parents' room, and put it in the pen. When I had installed the things in the CD AND the add-on from the [...] website, I tried out my new tablet. At first it worked like a charm. However, I noticed that in certain spots, the pen would stop working. I went over and over the same spot, but the computer would only register few movements in that general area. Once some time had passed, I could draw over that area easily, but another area would become "dead", or so I thought. It went like this for about two weeks, and then I finally changed the battery to, what else, the battery that came with the tablet. The "dead" spots disappeared altogether. In short, the batteries that come with that come with the tablet are not a sham. They're good, really good. In fact, I'm still using the first battery that came with the tablet. Installation: I heard to ignore the CD altogether when installing it, but I chose to ignore the advice instead. To tell you the truth, I'm glad I ignored the advice. After all, why would Genius send something that would just mess with the computer? Do they REALLY want a thousand people, per day, telling them that their CD does not do what it is intended to do? My advice is to pop in the CD, read through the already printed instructions, wait for the 10+ minutes of installation (depending on your computer RAM, I think), and download the add-on from [...] for your specific operating system (OS). After that, if you have the same problem with sensitivity that I had, you should check the settings with the tablet often in case they change unexpectedly. Other than that, your tablet, after you check the battery on the pen, will be working well. Overall, this tablet is great. The ONLY thing that I have against this tablet is that it is too big for my work area. That, however, is something that applies only to me. Do your own measurements and it should become clear if you have enough space for this. Then again, you can clear area. I hope my review will help some of you thinking about buying this tablet and some of you who are having these temporary problems with the tablet. Thank you for reading, Abdiel

I'll be straight with you -- I've only used professional Wacom tablets. I'm spoiled. I'm an artist by trade, and found after upgrading my computer system that my 12 year old Wacom tablet had no driver support for Windows 7. Purchasing the Genius MousePen 8x6 tablet was an experiment to see if a cheaper make and model would suffice. Pros: The largest surface area for a graphics tablet for the money that I could find. Includes pen, mouse, and tablet. Does have pressure sensitivity, tracked accurately enough to do handwriting or casual drawing. Cons: You get what you pay for. It doesn't claim to be a professional tablet. It's described as a "home and office graphic tablet" because it's meant for the causal user. That said, after using Wacom Tablets for so many years, this tablet felt exceedingly cheap and flimsy to me. Software wasn't very good, and drivers seemed less bulletproof than I would expect. Tablet: This will sound like a stupid criticism if you aren't someone who spends a lot of hours using a tablet doing artwork -- but the tablet surface, touching the pen to it, felt scratchy, cheap, and distracting. If you're doing hours of work drawing and sketching on the computer, it's less than ideal. Again, for $40 bucks, maybe if I were a high school kid or casual digital painter, I could get used to it. Pen: The pen uses a AA battery. Pull it apart into two pieces, and the battery goes on this thin, flimsy strip of metal that touches each end. The construction looked like the inside of a $2 kid's flashlight. Wacom pens, by comparison, use no batteries, relying on magnetic induction or... unicorn spit, or some such thing -- I don't exactly know. I've just never heard of one breaking, ever. A handy tip -- be very careful when installing the battery into the Genius pen, and align the two halves precisely. I didn't, and it got seriously jammed in the wrong position. I nearly broke the thing trying to pry it apart again. And never, EVER, twist the two pieces while together for ANY reason. Also, since the Genius pen (and many other brands of non-Wacom pens) uses a battery, it made the pen feel a bit fat and clunky in my hand -- and I'm a big dude. Maybe you won't care or notice. For $40 bucks, I could get used to it. But if I were some petite little artist using this thing for a substantial amount of time, I imagine it might feel a little like I was handling some goofy circus clown pen. Again, it's semi-subjective, so you might feel differently. Lastly, there was more springiness in the pen's point than I'm used to, allowing for a fair amount of compression, which made its handling feel awkward for drawing. Again, maybe I could've gotten used to it. Mouse: Again, less substantial than Wacom mice. Worked okay. It had this middle mouse rocking switch instead of a rolling wheel, which I didn't care for. Manuals and Software: Software for a tablet is important because you frequently use different settings in different programs. The Genius tablet's manuals and software are weird and clunky, lack many customization features I'm accustomed to, and using it you immediately are aware that the software was made on the cheap. It has frequent goofy English mis-translations, typos, and grammatical errors that just don't say "quality product". Compatibility and Performance: Its pressure sensitivity seemed to work or not work depending on what program I was working in. I was using it in high-end graphics software, sure, but at least the drivers should have been relatively bulletproof, right? The final straw that got this product boxed back up and returned to the seller was that ultimately I simply could not get pressure sensitivity to work with ZBrush, my primary work program. To Sum Up: For the money, the Genius MousePen 8x6 Graphic Tablet offers as large a work surface as I could find. The pressure sensitivity and tracking weren't bad, but were not what you'd want for a serious hobbyist or professional artist. Its construction is flimsy, and the drivers and software are cheap and far less than I'd be willing to put up with. But you get what you pay for. This tablet would be a great, affordable birthday party gift for someone else's 10 year old kid who likes doing art with MS Paint or something. For my own kid, I'd be inclined to spend more money and get a used Wacom Intuos or other professional quality Wacom graphics tablet. (I've not used their cheaper "Bamboo" line of tablets, so I can't speak to their quality.) This tablet would also be fine for an adult who just wants to doodle, use hand writing in programs such as OneNote, or prefers a pen to a mouse. For a professional artist, serious art hobbyist, or art student, if I literally had nothing more than $40 bucks or so to spend, and I needed a graphics tablet, I would borrow some cash from someone and buy a used Wacom before getting this thing. A 10 year old Wacom is easily superior to this tablet for doing real art -- in its durability, tracking, ergonomics, and most especially drivers and software.

I bought this back in 2010 and upgraded to a Wacom two years ago, so it has been a while since I used this. For around $40 in 2010, it was a good price to get a graphics tablet. I used it in Windows XP, Vista, and Windows 7 with Adobe Photoshop CS5. When I last used it, there were issues with Photoshop, which is the program I used it in most often besides Illustrator. The pressure sensitivity often had to be manually reset every time I reopened Photoshop. It got annoying after a while. Also, Photoshop would occasionally not sense the tablet if it was plugged in -after- I started Photoshop. Last, sometimes, for no reason at all, it would begin drawing only straight lines in Photoshop. I could control where the line began and ended, and that was it. Restarting Photoshop solved the last problem, but it was very disruptive at times. The tablet is made of plastic and feels flimsy at times around the edges. The pen is bulky and the area for drawing, I soon discovered, is a little too small to be comfortable. It is fine for beginning and playing and certainly enough to do a lot of things with (when you remember to plug it in before opening Photoshop), but any graphic designer or artist would eventually want to upgrade. I let a six-year-old cousin play with it in 2013. It still worked, and he was satisfied with it. I never used the mouse, so I have nothing to say about it. As a note not directly about the tablet's quality or my experience, I cannot believe that people are trying to sell this tablet for $250 now. For $250, I would definitely not recommend this. For $40 today, -if- the Photoshop issues are fixed, it is worth trying as a cheap tablet.

So i think the reviews written by everyone else here sums up quite a bit of the fears i had about purchasing this tablet. Basically my biggest issue is it appears the drivers are outdated and don't work well with all the graphics applications i use. Folks who use CS3 report no problems at all with this device. Unfortunately i just purchased CS4 and this tablet has major issues in it (pressure sensitivity not responding randomly after a few minuts, drawing an arc and it draws a strait line or dot of varying opacity). After talking with the folks at Adobe (and getting no response from Genius) i narrowed it down to Genius' out of date drivers (which that's apparently correct). So the pros\cons layed out by others are pretty accurate. When i got mine everything functioned perfectly, no dead batteries, etc... The tablet itself is a fantastic deal w/ great potential especially for $49.99 (now). The user programmable areas on the sides are great, the quick access menu up top is awesome, and the drawing space and overall feel of using it was great. It did however seem a bit flimsy when placed on the lap (how i like drawing) but on a flat surface (even a book) no worries. Note that i DID try this with "The GIMP 2.6", Corel Painter X, Blender 2.48 etc... basically all the other software i use, and while those performed /almost/ perfectly 100% Of the time, there were still glitches. You just can't have that while you're in the middle of creating something. Thankfully Amazon.com is amazing w/ returns because it's already on it's way back. Sad this is the first item i've EVER returned from any online purchase i've made EVER (and i've made a lot). Oh well they almost had a great product, if the drivers were a bit more up to date, this would hands down be a great purchase. I decided to go for a Wacom Bamboo, feel free to venture on over there as i've written a review on my experience thus far. Hope it helps, Frank...

I was looking for a cheapo graphic tablet. I ended up here. I bought this product for less than 50 bucks, new. (The Genius MousePen 8 x 6-Inch Graphic Tablet for Home and Office) I was a little worried because there were a lot of negative reviews...... Now that I have put hands on it, I am glad I ignored the nay-sayers. I have a Wacom Intuos 3 at work. I actually PREFER this genius product. I had no trouble installing at all, however I did have to get my drivers from a 3rd party site....... No worries tho because they worked perfectly and easily with no hassle. It works fantastically well in Photoshop. I am thinking that some of those who were having issues with pressure in photoshop may not realize that in Cs3 and Cs4 there is no longer a selection box that says "use pressure" and that hey have to enter the brush control box and adjust it under dynamics. For instance if you want to control stroke width or color jitter with pressure you open the Shape Dynamics Menu and define your preferences. You can then lock the brush prefernce to "always on" if you wanted too...... tho I can't imagine why you would want to........ The shortcuts on the tablet itself were super easy to program and they make integrating this tablet into my workflow a breeze. The pen is perfectly senstitive , and it is very easy to change the pen's sensitivity level if you desire to do so; it is also very ergonomic and comfortable. The tablet is slimmer than I would have guessed from the picture (thats a good thing!), and it looks really nice on my desktop. I am no stranger to graphics tablets and this is a darn good one. I actually like it better than the Intuos. If you are used to an intuos and use the eraser a lot you may miss it, as it is not present with the "Genius MousePen 8 x 6-Inch Graphic Tablet for Home and Office". Personally I prefer hotkeys in just about every venue. For a 1024 sensitivity tablet this is a phenomenal price. I like the pressure curves BETTER from this than the Intuos. I have only 2 minor gripes: - The mouse that is included is pretty much worthless. It doesn't really matter to me as I rarely use one and prefer a trackball style when I do anyways. - 2 The cradle for the pen could have been done a little better. I woulda rather had a little molded plastic pen stand than the crummy mouse lol. Very minor gripes indeed. If you are looking for a good graphics tablet, regardless of your budget, you could do a lot worse than this excellent product. 5 stars, I am really happy.

As a matter of background, I have always preferred using a track ball rather than a mouse and was looking for something with minimal stress when using point-and-click interface devices. My work generally involves using AutoCAD, writing documents, working on spreadsheets and preparing presentations and graphics (which usually go into the documents, spreadsheets and presentations). Though I have not suffered from any severe repetative stress injuries, I have had recurring knots in the muscles of my right shoulder. I looked at the ergonomic 'this' and the molded 'that' but what got me thinking about graphics tablets was a coworker. He had injured his wrists in an accident and he could use no mouse or trackball comfortably. He showed me his full size Intuos4 (Wacom) and I was impressed. My interest in Wacom ended when I saw the sticker price. Though I did not have a chance to try out my coworker's Intuos, I could see by the shape and style of the stylus/pen how easily a person could adapt to using something like this. It would be no more stressful than writing (at worst) and scribbling (at best). Disappointed by the Wacom's price, I searched for other tablets and found this one. When I performed an internet search on this Genius tablet, I went to the negative reviews first to see what the worst case scenarios were. Knowing Amazon would stand behind their product and I could return it, I placed my order. I received this several months ago and have been using it regularly. After I unpacked the graphics tablet, pen, tablet mouse, etc., I installed the provided drivers and then connected the graphics tablet. I did not install anything other than just the drivers and maybe the PenSuite program. Everything worked without a problem from the start. I was concerned about using the graphics tablet and pen with a laptop when my work moved me to a position that would be mobile. Using care about the cord, the tablet packs well. It is very lightweight and its surface area is slightly smaller than my laptop. When packed, it is somewhat protected by my carry case and I usually sandwich it between the laptop and various books and papers. The pen for the tablet goes in a side compartment of my carry case so that the pen tip is not constantly activated (wears down the battery). I do not use the tablet mouse included with the kit. What pleasantly suprised me is that even though the included pen can left- and right-click, my computer has no problem recognizing the pen/graphics tablet as well as my track ball AND the touch pad on my laptop at the same time. I now usually use the laptop's (or trackball's) left- and right-click with one hand and navigate on the tablet with the pen using the other. One of the great features is that the graphics tablet is mapped to your screen. When I take my laptop to a docking station with a separate monitor and plug in the mouse pad, it automatically maps to both the laptop and the additional screen when I plug it in! A great feature that this graphics tablet has is the user-configured 'hot buttons'. They are a series of several small 'hot spots' lined up against the far left, top and far right of the graphics tablet. These are great to configure for quick launching programs or performing other functions. The cherry on top is the fact that the surface that the mouse pen contacts is a thin transparent plastic sheet. There is a notch so that you can lift the sheet and put just about any paper or photo underneath. I use a simple sheet of paper that I jotted with notes that relate which hotbuttons do what function (note that the top row of hot buttons is pre-assigned (e.g. 'open', 'save', 'copy', etc.)). The battery life in the pen is okay for me - a new battery every four months or so doesn't seem too bad. A few notes for those who have read negative comments or are generally skeptical about this product: the mouse pen needs to be in the immediate vicinity of the tablet surface. If you are not on or within about one inch (just less than three centimeters) you WILL have problems navigating with the mouse pen. I presume the same is the case with the mouse itself. There is a reason that Genius advertises 1024 levels of pressure sensitivity with the mouse pen - you need to apply pressure. The work I do does not need that many levels of sensitivity and so general light pressure (like sketching lightly on a piece of paper) is enough. While I think the resolution of the mouse pen and touch pad is really good (2000 LPI according to the manufacturer), I am not good enough to write my name on a grain of rice or copy the painting from dome of the Sistine Chapel onto the back of a business card. For more information, check the Genius website [...]