Wacom - Bamboo Ink Smart Stylus - Black

I'm going to break this review down into the groups of people I'd highly recommend this to: (1) If you just bought the 2017 Surface Pro, I would give this pen some heavy consideration before you buy the Surface Pen. I tested this pen with the Surface Pro I bought. For $30 less, this pen is so smooth, glides like butter across the screen. The Surface Pen has the "tilt" feature and double the levels of pressure, but honestly I think the tilt feature is just a novelty and you will not notice the difference in pressure levels. What you will notice, though, is that the Bamboo Ink pen is just a hair less laggy than the Surface Pen. The Surface Pen has come a long way in terms of reducing latency, but for $30 less, it's hard to argue against the Bamboo Ink except in two areas – first, the Bamboo Ink pen will not stick to the side of your Surface like the Surface Pen will. The Bamboo Ink pen also doesn't have an eraser at the tip (instead you'll have to press a button on the side to erase). If those are dealbreakers for you (understandable, especially the eraser part), go for the Surface Pen. But if saving a bit of cash while still having a phenomenal, smooth experience interests you, you honestly can't go wrong with Bamboo Ink. (2) If you have a Surface Pro 4, Surface Book, or Surface 3 device, and you've lost your pen or want to upgrade your pen, this is the one for you. I tested this pen with a Surface Book. Again, this pen doesn't have an eraser at the end, nor can you stick it to the side of your device magnetically, but this is a solid pen here. This is a miles quicker than pen that you're probably used to, the one that's supposed to come with these devices. Lag is noticeably reduced. This is just a wonderful pen. (3) Finally, if you have any other device that can take advantage of Wacom pens, you need to shoot for this one here. I tested the Bamboo Ink pen with a 2017 HP Spectre 13'' 4k and the 15'' variant, and wow! Seeing your own handwriting in 4k is already amazing, but on these devices, it's just like pen to paper. It's hard to put into words how great it was. Buttery smooth. Accurate. Beautiful. I'm definitely a fan of the Bamboo Ink with devices in this category. This is so much better than the included pen HP gives you, just fyi. More comfortable too. Excellent product!

I'm currently using the pen with my new Surface Pro (2017) and I'm quite impressed with it's performance. Lag is minimal and it performs smoothly while sketching and taking notes in MS OneNote. I'm no veteran at using stylus pens but there are some cons I think are worth noting. Naturally I want to flip the pen over to use the eraser which is a feature of the Surface Pen but it didn't take long to adjust. (I have a new Surface Pen (2017) but I haven't taken it out of the box yet. I wanted to give the Bamboo and through chance before committing to the more expensive option.) Using the erase function is a little awkward having to search and hold the button on the side. It's a little further back on the pen and in an unnatural place for me. I tend to spin the pen in my hand thus losing the orientation of the button as I write and I often times find myself searching for the button each time I need to erase. It's just easier to use the onscreen eraser option which defeats the purpose of the button. The button at the end of the pen where an eraser would normally be is a little odd feeling and seemingly flimsy. It's held up well but sometimes its difficult to tell if I've applied enough pressure to activate the pen tools menu on the Surface Pro. On the other end, the tip glides nicely and having extra tips is great bonus for this price. There is some travel on the tip when pressing down on the stylus that takes some getting used. This rarely affects its performance but sometimes when I need to make the lightest pen stroke, it doesn't register on screen. I can see and feel the pen coming in contact with the screen but nothing happens. I did experience a short battery life in my opinion. Again I'm not that experienced in using this type of stylus so I have nothing to compare to but 3 weeks of light use does seems short. Overall, I think this is a 5 star pen at this price and even more so when you can get it on sale as I did. I believe the minor cons as I mentioned warrant a deduction of 1/2 rather than a full 1 star. If your looking for a stylus for light use and something you're not afraid to let your young kids use, this is the perfect stylus! I think professional or heavy users will rather look at the newer MS Surface Pro Pen (2017) which share very similar specs.

I originally bought this after seeing some of the demos in store. My brother had requested this as a gift for his birthday last month and seems to be pleased with what he can do with it. I should have borrowed his and tried it with my touchscreen before making a purchase for myself. Both my brother and I have Dell Inspiron 2-in-1 touchscreens, both about the same size, however his is about a year newer than mine. Apparently that year makes a huge difference. While it seems to work with no issue on his computer (that I am aware of), I can only get it to pair with my computer, and nothing else. I cannot change any settings. I cannot get it to control anything on the touchscreen. Whereas the instructions and support page online say pushing the top button once will open the Microsoft Ink Workspace, it would open up One Note instead, and would not allow me to change that either. I tried to change the protocol settings on the pen itself by holding the two side buttons, but had no luck. I have searched for multiple ways to try and get it to work, but have not been successful. When I started looking at this for myself, I did inquire of one of the reps in the computer department about compatibility, and he only insisted that I needed Microsoft Ink to be installed/enabled on my computer and it would work fine. It is clear now that I received errant information from the rep, and the lack of information about products seems to be a growing issue lately, regardless of specific product. It may be possible that my computer is not equipped with Microsoft pen protocol, but that is a possible conclusion I have come to after failing to get this product to work. It is quite misleading with the packaging (and some of the in-store advice) to suggest that it will work, no matter what, as long as you have Windows Ink enabled. But only after the fact did I notice that the packaging (in fairly small lettering) refers you to Wacom's website to determine compatibility.

I ordered the Bamboo Ink to us on my HP x360 and it doesn't work. I downloaded the driver from Wacom and on installation it popped up an error message. I finally went to the section that lists the devices it has been tested on and works. Here is the list.. Made for Windows 10 devices ASUS Transformer Pro T304UA/ TransBook T304UA ASUS Transformer Mini T102HA/ TransBook Mini T102HA Dell™ Venue 10 Pro™ 5000 Series (5055) Dell™ XPS 13 2in1 Fujitsu LIFEBOOK® P727 Fujitsu LIFEBOOK® T937 HP EliteBook x360 1030 G2 HP Elite x2 1012 G1 HP Elite x2 1012 G2 HP ENVY 8 Note Tablet HP Pro x2 612 G2 HP Spectre x360 13-ac000 Lenovo™ ThinkPad X1 Tablet Lenovo™ ThinkPad Yoga 260 Lenovo™ ThinkPad® X1 Yoga™ Lenovo™ ThinkPad® P40 Yoga™ Lenovo™ ThinkPad® 10 (2nd Gen) Lenovo™ Miix 510 Lenovo™ Miix 720 Lenovo Yoga 720 (13") Microsoft® Surface® 3 Microsoft® Surface® Pro 3 Microsoft® Surface® Pro 4 Microsoft® Surface® Book Toshiba dynabook V62/B Toshiba dynabook V42/B Toshiba dynaPad N72 If your device is listed here get it, otherwise don't bother.

The first pen I received didn't work. The second pen I received and physically brought my Dell Inspiron 13-7378 into store because I didn't want to run into issues but was reassured it was compatible turned out to NOT be once no one in the store would help me I had to drive home so I could connect to wifi to find out once again the product wouldn't work. I've been on the phone for 2 hours, (and currently still am on hold) transferred 14 times (I wish I was exaggerating) and hung up on 3 times. The two stars is solely for the pen probably being a good product when used on the correct device, but surely not for the horrendous customer service I've received and have yet to be helped. **********I enclosed a picture of my call log to prove the type of customer service best buy brings, you can also note up top the time 20:13 which indicates the amount of time I've been on hold and also the true time being 1934 to show how long I've been attempting to talk to someone about this issue.*************

Do not buy this product unless it is set up in store to work with the device you are buying. The Bamboo Ink product is being promoted as ready to use on compatible devices but the reality is if your device is not specifically listed as supported it likely will not work and there is virtually no support by Wacom. A common experience is the pen device being able to access the Ink application but not being able to draw. The instructions that come with the device are simple quick start pictoral instructions, nothing with detail for troubleshooting. The Wacom website Bamboo Ink section looks slick but has no manual and the link for "Instructions" returns none. The FAQs section provides no help. The driver update would not install because a supported tablet was not found - even though the laptop is a Windows Ink device. Wacom Product Support told me to contact the laptop manufacturer regarding the compatibility. The laptop manufacturer was unable to help regarding a problem clearly with a third-party accessory. This product has frustrated me unlike any other. Because I received a package discount on my purchase I only get back half of what I paid in returning it. :(

It does a good job with Windows 10 computers that are made for Ink. In other words, it's specialized and is great in its place. If you work with only 1 type of computer this is a great stylus. However, many of us work on multiple units & types of units. With Wacom I need Ink for Windows and FineLine for the iPad. This is the 21st century. One stylus should handle multiple computers. I understand that only 1 of them might have the specialized functions, but the stylus should at least be basically functional on more computers. This is how Pencil53 is. The eraser doesn't work in many apps but at least the stylus works nicely with Windows & iPad. (But it has other issues regarding design that aren't relevant here.) The Bamboo Ink has a nice feel and works very well in its 1 tiny niche. It runs from a 4A battery which is easy to find. It paired quickly with my HP laptop. If my iPad would recognize this stylus, I would be totally enthusiastic. I would definitely recommend this to a friend who used only a Windows-based touchscreen-based computer, such as my laptop/tablet.

I use this for note taking on an HP Envy X360 in MPP mode. Sometimes there's a little lag in input initialization every time you lift the pen, but I usually write in cursive, so it's not too much of a problem. When writing in print, the lag is just slight enough that letters end up looking a little disjointed. Lines are clean, no random jagged points or false input. I wouldn't recommend it for artists, the slight lag would probably be quite infuriating, and the lack of Tilt would probably make a higher end pen worth the extra cost. Using the side button for erase was a little odd at first, my last device had a Wacom Feel pen with an eraser top; I got used to the side button pretty quick, but sometimes finding it isn't as seamless as flipping the pen over. I've had mine for 19 days now, and the battery is dead. Maybe it was an issue with the battery that came with it, but at this rate I'll be spending almost as much in a year on batteries as I bought the stylus for in the first place. I did find, after replacing the battery, that if you twist the cap most of the way it will disconnect the battery but still retain the cap. Hoping this will make the this battery last much longer. If not I guess I'll look into purchasing AAAA in bulk online.