I've owned a pen-only Wacom tablet before and I think they make good products, but if you get this one you should be aware of several points that I didn't figure out until I started using this one, although, to be fair, there were indications to some problems on the web, I just sort of flaked in my research.
1)The Draw: The drawing and pen functions with the pad are terrific, and unless you're used to high-end tablets, this will probably be fine for you, although the surface is rougher than the older, pen-only tablets and I suspect will wear out nibs fairly quickly. They supply you with three extras.
2)The Touch: While the touch on this, even the "tap to click" works pretty well, I'm not able to use it full time as my interface -- I still use a Logitech track ball. If you're used to one of the glass touchpads on a Macbook or Macbook pro, this will seem a bit sluggish, but if you're used to the trackpad supplied with many netbooks (Like my Dell mini)this thing will be a revelation. Overall it's nice.(There are scrolling issues, see below.) The mouse buttons have a nice, smooth feel, too. Not too clicky, but not so soft you don't know you're pushing them. Mind you, this is after just two days of use. I have no idea about the durability.
3)The Size: This is the larger of the Bamboo Fun tablets. While it should have been blindingly obvious, I suppose, that this was going to be big, it really does take up a lot of room on the desktop. To use it as a touch interface, it's really more than you need. There may people who need the extra space for graphics, but for day-to-day use, the smaller Bamboo Fun or Bamboo Craft touch/pen would have been fine. I'm working on two, 24 inch monitors and this is still way more space than I need. This is about the size of a 13inch laptop, so unless you have room for something that size on your desk all the time, in addition to your keyboard, the smaller Bamboo might be the way to go.
4)The Scroll: The two-fingered scroll function works great until it doesn't. I kept getting a lock up after a couple of swipes in Firefox 3.6, and even my trackball's scrolling would lock for fifteen seconds or so after it locked. This was fixed by turning off the auto-scroll and smooth-scrolling IN FIREFOX. That said, I found that solution in a forum where many people had reported scrolling problems and this fix didn't work for all of them. They also reported similar issues in Photoshop CS2 & CS3 as well. I'm using this with a Mac Pro 2x Xenon processor with 8GB ram, but people with Windows machines reported the problem as well. Wacom didn't seem to address it on their web page other than to respond to users that it, more or less, was the user's fault. I haven't tried it with Photoshop yet, but it seems to work fine in Painter and Art Rage Studio Pro, and I haven't had any scroll problems with the pen, only the touch functions. Your mileage may vary, but I'd be wary of expecting to use this as your only interface until you see a lot of "fixes" reported on the web.
5)The Design: It looks very spiffy, especially if you like the brushed-aluminum look and feel. It's substantial, too - heavy enough to stay in place on the desk. There's a loop for the pen to go into, which is a nice addition my earlier Wacom didn't have. (I use stick-on Velcro to keep the pen attached to that one.)As other's have said, though, the USB cable is permanently attached to the tablet instead of plugging in with a mini-USB plug, as earlier models did. This could become a durability problem if you travel with the tablet a lot, as the connection point isn't very heavily reinforced.
6)In Conclusion: You are more or less in a one-player game. For the price, you can't really get a pen pad with touch from anyone except Wacom, and if this is your first tablet, again, I think you'll probably love it, but do look at the smaller touch/pen tablet first, maybe save yourself some cash, and expect to keep your mouse around for a while, at least, until you iron out any touch navigation problems that you may have with your particular applications. Wacom Bamboo Fun Tablet
I spent quite a bit of time looking at various tablets, reading reviews, and trying to figure out which had the most bang for the buck; the Bamboo Fun won in just about every category. Please note that I am not a professional graphic artist, just a hobbyist (though technically savvy enough to understand the features [eg pressure sensitivity]), so I'm reviewing it from that perspective.
Installation was a snap. Download the latest drivers from the Wacom site, plug it into a USB port, and you're all set. I tried it out on two laptops and a desktop and installation was flawless on each.
The tablet is thin and light, with a more-than-adequate amount of active space (I wanted something that would let me do longer strokes without feeling cramped). The multi-touch capability is really nice with graphics programs that support it; being able to pan and zoom with my left hand while my right remains mostly dedicated to drawing is great (and a quick press of one of the Bamboo's 4 buttons will turn touch off, which comes in handy [no pun intended]). For reference, the touch-sensitive area is 7.5" x 5.1" and the pen-active area is a fairly generous 8.5" x 5.4". You can configure it for left-handed use (lefties rejoice!).
The tablet is very smooth and responsive with Sketchbook Pro and ArtRage 2.5. I wasn't that thrilled with Corel Painter 4 Essentials, which comes bundled with it; the UI was clunky and not very intuitive (spend the $20 on ArtRage instead - you won't regret it). The Bamboo Fun also comes bundled with Photoshop Essentials, which should be useful if you don't already have a full version of Photoshop.
The battery-less pen, with two configurable buttons and 1024 levels of pressure sensitivity, is very comfortable in the hand and I admit it, I love the eraser on the end. :) The tablet has a fabric loop on one side for holding the pen when transporting it.
The tablet comes with three extra nibs and an extraction tool, which isn't listed in the product description.
Overall, for a couple of steps above entry level I wouldn't hesitate to recommend the Bamboo Fun as a great tablet for the price. - Bamboo Fun - Graphics Pad - Tablet - Pen Tablet'
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