7P Drawing tablets

Laptops for digital art

RAM

These RAM recommendations are based my experience doing on doing 2D illustration using Krita and Clip Studio Paint.

RAMMY TAKE

4GB

NOT ENOUGH. AVOID.

8GB

OK-idh

16GB

GOOD - the average person will be fine here

32GB

EXCELLENT

Pen display connection

Before you buy a laptop, please ensure that you are clear how you intend to connect it to your pen display. More here: Connecting a pen display

I recommend that you get a laptop with at least 1 USB-C port that supports DP-alt mode (any thunderbolt 3 or thunderbolt 4 port will so). Ideally, a laptop should have two such ports. See: USB-C DisplayPort alt mode

If you want to connect to a pen display with a single USB-C cable, you should really this document to ensure you understand the requirements for ports and cables: Connecting a pen display with a single USB-C cable.

Power consumption

Pen tablets don't draw much power at all from a laptop, so it won't diminish your battery time.

Pen displays on the other hand draw a lot of power and if your laptop is powering your pen display, then it is going to limit the time your laptop can work on battery power.

For a pen display, you should either

  • Keep the laptop connected to power from the wall.

  • Or, connect the pen display to get power from another source

Specific laptops I recommend

Windows

  • Surface Pro 8, 9, and 10 (but NOT 11 - see the note on Windows on ARM Below)

  • Surface Laptop Studio

  • Surface Laptop 5 & 6 (not NOT 7 - see the note on Windows on ARM Below)

  • Samsung Galaxy Book3 Pro 360

  • Samsung Galaxy Book4 Pro 360

Important note on Windows on ARM laptops

IMPORTANT: DO NOT get a Surface Pro that uses an ARM processor (example: Microsoft Surface Pro 11). ARM-based Windows machines do not work with drawing tablets at the moment. More here: Windows on ARM.

Macs

  • 2023 M3 MacBook Pro

Chromebooks

I don't recommend Chromebooks for use with drawing tablets. I don't think drawing tablets work well with Chromebooks. More here: Using a drawing tablet with a Chromebook.

What I use

Microsoft Surface Pro 8

I've been using a Surface Pro 8 with 16GB of RAM and 500GB of storage for two years now.

I connect it the Microsoft Surface Dock 2 for power and network connectivity.

I use two Thunderbolt 3 cables from the Surface Pro 8 to connect two 4K 60Hz displays (one of those will be the a 4K pen display)

The Surface Pro can be used for drawing with its own pen. However I don't like drawing with the Surface pen. Instead, I prefer to use attached drawing tablets.

Connected tablets

Most often, I use these tablets with my Surface Pro 9:

  • Wacom Intuos Pro (PTH-860)

  • Wacom Cintiq Pro 27 (DTH-271)

  • Wacom Cintiq Pro 16 (DTH-167)

Though I've used every kind successfully: Huion, XP-Pen, and Xencelabs.

2023 M3 Macbook Pro

  • Size: 14" (I wish I had purchased the 16" though)

  • Chip: M3 Pro

  • Memory: 36GB

  • Storage: 1TB

I've used it for about 6 months as of June 2024 and my experience with it has been fantastic. I have no problems recommending it.

It has three Thunderbolt 4 ports which is excellent.

Videos

Resources

Places to find other suggestions

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