7P notes: 13" pen displays compared

Overview

13" pen displays very popular, often representing great choices for beginners. In this document I discuss some popular options in the market

Summary

These are very, very similar tablets. There is NO CLEAR winner - each has positives and negatives.

  • Huion Kamvas 13

    • slightly less pointer lag (GOOD)

    • slightly more more anti-glare sparkle

  • XP-Pen Artist 13 GEN2

    • a tiny bit more pointer lag

    • less anti-glare sparkle

Evaluation notes

Testing Setup

  • Driver versions used

    • Huion: 15.6.2.80

    • XP-Pen: 3.4.0

  • Operating system of test machine

    • Huion: Windows 11

    • XP-Pen: Windows 10

  • Specs

    • The tables of specs come from the Huion and XP-Pen websites. For some specs, I did some testing to come up with the numbers.

  • Variances

    • Please remember that how tablets work can vary even with tablets that have the same model number. I cannot guarantee everyone will experience what I encountered.

  • Pen labeling

    • I used gaffer tape to identify the pens. Green = XP-PEN, Red=Huion.

Pens

  • X-Pen Artist 13 GEN2 - X3 ELITE

  • Huion Kamvas 13 - PW517

  • Wacom One GEN1 - CP-913

Center versus Corner accuracy

Accuracy in both tablets is very good for a pen display

In my testing

  • Both have similar center accuracy. I agree with their listed specs of ±0.5mm

  • Both have similar corner accuracy. I measured at ± 2mm

Diagonal wobble

Both tablets have excellent diagonal wobble (i.e. very low amounts of diagonal wobble) with both slow and fast strokes.

XP-Pen Artist 13 GEN2 (CD130FH) wobble

Huion Kamvas 13 (GS1331) wobble:

Compare it to the most expensive pen tablet wacom makes the Wacom Intuos Pro Large (PTH-860):

Both the Huion and XP pen are on par with

Anti-glare sparkle

Both tablets exhibit some anti-glare sparkle. Ideally tablets should exhibit no sparkle.

  • iPad -> no observable sparkle

  • Wacom Cintiq Pro -> very low sparkle

  • Wacom One -> low sparkle

  • XP-Pen Artist 13 (2nd gen) -> On the low end of moderate sparkle

  • Huion Kamvas 13 -> moderate sparkle

For both tablets you'll notice the sparkle if your eyes are close, at a normal drawing distance I don't notice it.

The XP-Pen tablet is clearly the winner over the Huion tablet for AG sparkle.

Drawing Experience

Both tablets handle these cases well

  • drawing lots of dots

  • drawing many small quick tiny low pressure lines - hatching

  • keeping pressure constant

  • moving between high and low pressure smoothly

  • Tapering - typical for every pen display I've seen.

Overall drawing experience is very good for both tablets.

Pressure range

  • Remember: Pressure is detected by the pen, not the tablet.

  • The lower bound on the pressure range is called the Initial Activation Force.

  • To test this I hung each pen from a string and dragged the tip of the pen across the surface. The goal is that the minimal weight for the pen will draw a continuous line. Here's how they ranked:

    • XP-Pen Artist 13 2nd Gen -> made no marks whatsoever

    • Huion Kamvas 13 -> half the time made a mark. if pen moves slowly mark is captured usually but if there the pen is moving a little faster the mark is not registered.

    • Wacom One -> about same as the Huion Kamvas 13

    • Wacom Intuos Pro Large (PTH-860) -> draws a continuous line

    • Huion Giano (G930L) -> draws a continuous line

  • Between the two, Huion is the clear winner with its lower IAF.

Pointer lag

Both Huion and XP-pen models tested exhibit the typical pointer lag present with all pen displays. The lag is comparable to the Wacom One pen display (DTC-133).

Manufacturers don't publish lag numbers. So, this is subjective:

  • The Huion has about the same amount of lag as the Wacom One

  • The XP-Pen model has a bit more more lag than the Huion model

Both tables can be successfully used for creative applications. But Huion is the winner here over the XP-Pen model.

Parallax

Thanks to their laminated displays both have very good parallax. They match that of Wacom One.

Below is a parallax photo for several pen tablet models. The XP-Pen parallax similar to the picture of the Wacom One and Huion model in the photo.

Connecting with a 3 in 1 cable

Both tablets come with a 3-in-1 cable.

The end that goes into the tablet is USB-C.

The other 3 ends are:

  • HDMI - connect to computer

  • USB-A for data - connect to computer

  • USB-A for power - this cable is colored red.

    • if your computer can provide enough power you can plug the cable into the computer

    • Or you can connect to a USB power adapter. Neither tablet comes with a USB power adapter.

Connecting with one USB-C cable

For both tablets, I was able to use a single USB-C cable to connect them to the computer. More here: Connecting a pen display with one USB-C cable

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