So after bursting onto the scene in 2019, everyone was hopeful Xencelabs would challenge Wacom in more than just high-end pen tablets (ie. Intuos line), but also in the pen display market.
My initial thoughts unfortunately, are this thing is way too dam bulky and too expensive compared to Huion and XP-Pen alternatives.
I mean you can already see (ironically) from their own product shot, the unflattering comparison to a 24" iMac. It lacks the modern design of the Dell Canvas ($1800), which came out 6 years ago:
Also in terms of specs, it doesn’t seem to offer anything over the Kamvas Pro 24 (also 4K, laminated-screen/AG-etched glass) for $1300, and is much pricier than the XP-Pen Artist Pro 24 (1440p, matte, non-laminated, but reportedly low parallax) at only $900.
They also omitted touch-input, which imo immediately disqualifies it from being a true competitor to Wacom, making it more of a mid-tier option that sits between budget pen displays and Wacom. I still have to respect Dell’s design achievements with the Canvas, which no 3rd-party OEM seems to be able to come close in terms of elegance (and touch capability).
Though somewhat disappointing in terms of features and design, if the pen performance is flawless and display accuracy is perfect, there could still be case for this device, so I’ll hold judgement until reviews roll in.
In 2023, lack of multi touch at that price point is a non-starter for me. I get a lot of people are used to the physical shortcut keys for their workflow, but I’ve gotten very used to touch for mine, and I think that’s the general direction we’ll be heading for the future.
The price is too high for a non Wacom product so I would rather pay a bit more for the industry standard, the Cintiq Pro 24 ( if I was going to buy one ).
Also having used many Chinese screen, while the hardware is actually great, the driver issues on Windows is a headache. Many time the driver on their website is not the lastest one and you need to contact support to get the newest bug fixed driver ( which I can’t because I imported and they don’t support foreigners). Having to reinstall a driver on a weekly basis is no fun, and Windows break them often. Wouldn’t want paying 1900$ to risk possibilities of that driver problem. I heard Wacon had that problem as well but I’m too poor to buy Wacom and actually know.
I’m currently sticking with SuperDisplay for Wacom, touch, lightweight and beautiful high res screen of Samsung for much less than the price of the Cintiq Pro 13. SuperDisplay, for me at least, is super stable and never fail me as long as it is connected (unless Windows screw up and replace my GPU driver, which is not SuperDisplay fault). Still pinning for an used S8 Ultra, would have been a nice Cintiq Pro 16 alternative without all the screen heating and discoloring risk that people had been reporting.
Just curious, do you guys currently use a large format pen display? What are you guys looking for in an upgrade?
I previously had a Cintiq 22HD Touch (with Tilt Stand and then Ergotron arm), but I found it to be way to bulky on my desk. So I switched to the Dell Canvas with Articulating Stand which is much more manageable (and stable!) in terms physical ergonomics.
The key is that the flat design allows the Canvas itself to act as a drafting table, which can support traditional paper, digital slates, tablets, phones, keyboards, mice, etc. It becomes your desk.
With every other pen display, using a bulky stand raises the tablet at too high of an angel to use as a desktop. If you use a monitor arm, you can recover desk space—but—the arm will always have some degree of wobble. When I switched to the articulating stand, the extra stability was bliss and I’m never going back.
So in the end, I’ve been waiting so long for one of these Chinese manufacturers to clone the Canvas. Alas, it seems like they like their thick chassis. Even Wacom seems to fancy thicc for their new designs.
Currently I just have a 12.9 IPP as my only art tablet. I’m thinking of getting a Pen Display with multi-touch to double as a second monitor and for finishing pieces and then downgrading my IPP to an 11" for more portability for my initial sketches. Right now my workflow is I start sketches in Procreate, then transfer them to CSP and/or Vectornator Pro depending on what I need to do with them to finish the pieces. I would like a larger display for the CSP/Vectornator process, but don’t mind smaller for sketching. I’m just so used to touch now for all of the process that I can’t really imagine switching back to keyboard shortcuts. It’s been probably over 10 years since I worked with that process.
Interesting choice in which color gamut they chose to most fully support in Adobe versus the much more broadly used DCI-P3.
Obviously they are targeting Adobe photoshop/lightroom users, but switching from Adobe to the DCI-P3 or vice versa is not something that any app does very well at the moment IMHO.
It also will greatly restrict any 3rd party color calibration tools for the same reasons
I already gave up on big size in exchange for mobility. I barely sit in my home office, even on day off I would prefer going out to cafe or draw on my bed on work day night, a big expensive screen would be a waste. Highest I would go for is 16", but the tab S8 Ultra was actually very close in size and high res and actually cheaper than the Cintiq Pro 16, with higher availability and support services, I’m still waiting to buy it.
I have realized the more mobile the hardware, the more use it get from me, the better value the purchase is. The 8" Raytrektab despite its weakness is the Windows device that got more use than my beefy gaming laptop just because it fit nicely into my hand bag, so I still consider the 200$ purchase a stealth.
As someone who uses the keyboard keys (and disabled touch on samsung laptop) at what point did accidental taps stop being a thing? What art program do you use? Do you omit the keyboard entirely? Do you use any supplemental tap shortcut buttons?
I’m in the same boat. Before I didn’t care if my laptop weighed 10 lbs and require 3 power bricks and a laptop stand. Now, I just default to my S8U for most of my drawing needs. I’m kinda sad by this but that was the direction the industry was going, and I’m not the target demographic anymore. More of a side niche afterthought.
I think it depends on the software and hardware. I haven’t had many accidental touches in CSP both with my iPad Pro or with my old Windows tablet (AES). I do get accidental touches with Vectornator, but I am just so used to zooming and adjusting with my left hand that I’d rather deal with it than lose the touch there.
As far as shortcuts, I don’t use a keyboard. CSP has a really nice shortcut key option for iPads that you can align either to the left or right side of the screen and program whatever you want to it. Since I sketch in Procreate, it’s very touch focused and all of the shortcuts are all based on the pen and touch, so that’s just become more and more natural for me. I hope that all art programs continue to follow suit. CSP already supports a lot of similar touch options as well, as does Vectornator, though I’m still exploring it a little.
Overall I think it’s just a workflow thing. Lots of people learned with shortcut keys and no touch. I only dabbled with shortcut keys and really learned digital art with touch more than anything else. I was a traditional artist primarily up until 4-5 years ago and never really did much digitally other than edits for my traditional art scans prior to that. I think the more people who learn digital art on things like the iPad, the more touch centric we’ll see software becoming, and hopefully pen displays as well.
It’s interesting to see the Quick Keys remote attachment clip and 8 pen clip mounting slots, which mirror Wacom’s Cintiq Pro 27 screw hole mounting system.
The online quickstart guide also thoroughly detailed and illustrated:
The mounting system and documentation are nice touches that’s nice to see from a pro-level product. That means they are at least paying attention to the likes of Wacom and HP in their overall product usability and presentation.
I just realized this is probably because they are sourcing oversupplied 4K panels from several years ago, that never made it into 24" monitors. They keep the same display controllers which were calibrated for the Adobe RGB standard, before the DCI-P3 trend in current displays.
I believe all the Chinese pen display makers use the strategy of doing limited runs with whatever LCD panels happen to be cheap from the various LCD suppliers in China, which explains why they seem to release refreshes every few years, and never add a touch layer (extra expense which would cut into low margins ).
That’s an interesting theory and in fact there is an innolux panel that matches the reported specs and is currently being offered at “firesale prices”
If this is indeed the panel they are using, it’s a decent one though it has some minor issues with uniformity and grayscale linearity, though likely only at the levels that monitor nerds like me would care about.
I’ve been chatting with their marketing person for months. Their stock is really low right now but when they get ramped up, I might get a unit to review.
My initial thoughts is I think their is room for them. Their videos really highlight the pen experience. Thats what I want to test. Essentially the cost is going into those color certification (which I dont care about). I do love their version of the expresskey remote. In my Cintiq 27 videos, I noted how I thought Wacom should have done something similar. Either way, I post all my reviews here so if you guys have questions, ask away.
I will note, the review game is getting a lot harder. These companies are hesitent to send reviews of their expensive stuff. They always come back damaged. I can’t shell out cash for this just to review it.
The tech specs of Xencelabs pen display 24 is excellent, especially the 4K resolution. But Huion Kamvas 24 and xp-pen artist 24 pro with 2.5k resolution maybe a more affordable solution with same size.
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