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Archive notice: This article was originally published on September 25, 2018. Links and embedded videos are preserved as part of the historical record.
The Cintiq Pro from Wacom is a so-called pen display with a separate computing unit housed in a cassette. To transform the Wacom Cintiq Pro Pen Display into a fully-fledged workstation, simply insert the cassette into the slot provided at the back. If you want to use the pen display on a different computer, simply remove the cassette and connect the display to a Mac or PC.
The Pen Display and the computing unit housed in the cassette are supplied in separate boxes with cables, Express Remote, pen and holder. Both the display and the computing unit come with their own power supply unit and have their own power switches.
Display
The surface of the 24-inch 4K display is made of etched glass, which combines a pleasant, soft, rough feel with good anti-reflective properties. Despite the intimate proximity to the display – the typical working distance is around 20 centimetres depending on body posture – the display always appears finely resolved, the colours are vibrant with good contrast. Practical: The two edges of the display, which are around 10 centimetres wide, are magnetic and allow free placement of a pen holder, Express Remote or other magnetic objects.
With 8,192 pressure sensitivity levels and pixel-perfect resolution, the Pro Pen 2 acts as the primary input medium. An icon is selected by simply tapping on it, tapping twice corresponds to a double-click, an area is selected by placing the pen tip on it and dragging the area, the button at the front end of the pen serves as a right mouse button.
The hand symbol at the top right of the display is used to switch between touch and pen mode. In touch mode, input is also made using fingers and swipe gestures, just like on a smartphone or tablet. This works just as well as on most tablets or smartphones, but you first have to get used to the large display. Due to the size of the display, you tend to rest your arm on it after a short time, which occasionally leads to incorrect entries. As soon as you switch to pen mode, you can place your arms without any problems and the display only recognises the pen inputs.
If you touch a text input field with your pen or finger, a keyboard field automatically appears at the bottom of the screen – just like on a tablet. And just like on a tablet, you can use the keyboard to enter passwords and write short text passages. Anything beyond this quickly becomes tedious.
With 17 freely programmable buttons and a data wheel, the so-called Express Remote remote control, together with the radial menu that appears dynamically on the display, is able to call up a large number of short commands directly, while the lower back of the display is covered with a rubber layer that adheres well to smooth surfaces such as a desk. In addition, the display can be set up at an angle of 20 degrees instead of 5 degrees using two fold-out feet, which provides a more comfortable viewing angle. The Wacom Ergo Stand, which is available for an additional charge, offers more options for positioning the display.
Features
The actual workstation hardware is housed in the separately supplied cassette case and is supplied with power via its own power supply unit. With the Intel Xeon E3 1505v6, the Nvidia Quadro P 3200, 32 Gbyte RAM and the 512 Gbyte SSD, Wacom has packed professional hardware equipment into the compact cassette. There are two USB 3.0 ports and an SD card reader on the left and right side of the display. The remaining connections: 1 x USB-C, 1 x HDMI, 1 x Displayport and 2 x USB A.
Performance
As you are unlikely to be editing 4K footage or rendering 3D scenes on the Cintiq Pro, a powerful CPU is not absolutely necessary. Nevertheless, a minimum level of computing power is necessary for decent work, and the Intel Xeon E3 1505v6 delivers this with 725 points in the Cinebench multi-CPU benchmark and 2:59 minutes in the V-Ray CPU benchmark. Although this makes the CPU the slowest in the test field, the performance should be sufficient for the typical applications of the Wacom Cintiq Pro.
The CPU is actively supported by the graphics card, an Nvidia Quadro P3200, which threw 150.03 frames per second onto the display in the Cinebench 15 OpenGL test and also achieved a thoroughly acceptable value in the V-Ray GPU test with a rendering time of 2:12 minutes. In combination with the Xeon CPU and the 32 Gbytes of RAM, there is enough computing power and memory capacity available for the vast majority of 2D and 3D design tasks.
With 512 Gbytes, the SSD offers enough space for the operating system, applications and programme libraries and, with write rates of 942 and read rates of 1,399 Mbytes per second in the Aja system test in 4K Full, it is also fast enough not to slow anyone down at work.
As the Wacom Cintiq Pro was not designed and configured for audio or video, but for 2D and 3D design, the latency of 430 microseconds is fine.
The ventilation would also be a little too loud for an audio or video PC. The warm air starts to escape audibly from the ventilation slots at the top edge of the display at around 30% load. The louder the CPU and GPU are utilised, the louder the fan noise will be for a short time. In the long term, however, this can become exhausting as you are sitting directly next to the device. Under synthetic load with Aida 64, the fans didn’t turn much louder and the temperatures of the CPU and GPU levelled off at 70 to 80° C.
At this point, we would like to emphasise the direct operation via the display and the intuitive drawing with the Pro Pen 2, which make working with the Cintiq Pro a real pleasure. Together with the slightly roughened surface of the display, drawing with the pen almost feels like drawing with a pencil on slightly rough paper. The Pro Pen 2 even applies fine strokes and hatching without delay, and you can change the thickness of the pen or brush stroke by slightly increasing the pressure. You will have internalised this type of drawing after just a few minutes. The learning curve for calling up short commands via the radial menu and the buttons on the Express Remote is somewhat steeper. According to Wacom, from November there will also be a pen specifically for 3D design and modelling, the Pro Pen 3D, with an additional button for Plane Orientation etc.
Conclusion
After just a few minutes on the Wacom Cintiq Pro, you forget that you are actually sitting at a computer. Operation and data input via the Pro Pen 2 is so direct and intuitive that you never miss a mouse. On the contrary, after just a few hours on the Cintiq Pro, you tend to touch other computers on the display and are surprised that your attempts to get closer are ignored. I personally find drawing with the Pro Pen 2 easier than drawing in real life – thanks to Undo. The price for the display alone is absolutely justified due to the unique operation and the good display quality. The price for the Cintiq Pro Engine seems clearly too high in view of its performance and the fact that it can only be used together with the Cintiq Display. For the money, you can buy one of the much more powerful workstations with an i7-8700 CPU and GTX 1070 Ti graphics card, which are faster, quieter and more flexible to use.
Whether used alone as a display, in combination with the computing cartridge or another computer, the Cintiq Pro 24-inch from Wacom is an intuitive, precise tool for 3D and 2D design, illustration, technical drawing, creative drawing, painting and calligraphy – in short, all applications where many points and lines need to be drawn very precisely, but also very sensitively. You can read how the Cintiq performs for graphic designers and draughtsmen in a separate test in the next DP.
