I thought I'd write a little bit about Windows 7 today. I've been using it for about a month now primarily because my Samsung Netbook (which came with XP on it) won't run Vista but it will run Windows 7. For me moving onto beta software is a rather unusual step - sure I'll try it out and have a play, either in VMWare or on a spare test PC at work, but switching to something that's not finished yet felt like rather a bold step - but I couldn't stand XP a minute longer. If you are a Windows user who didn't move onto Vista you might not understand this. Everyone said Vista Sucks when it first came out (myself included) but there were several things that I liked about it and eventually even its idiosyncrasies it grew on me.

One of the things that a sudden switch back to XP meant was the loss of the 'breadcrumb trail' - I don't know if that's what it's called and tbh I can't be bothered to go find out its official name right now, mark me down as a lazy blogger if you like, either way here's a picture of the thing:

Initially when I started using Vista I thought that this thing was an attrocious idea. How would I be able to navigate my file system let alone my network if it looked like this?!
But little by little I got used to it. The ability to click on the name of the folder and see what was inside it was more useful than I'd originally given it credit for:

And for those times when I really do need the path to a folder (such as when I'm sending someone a link to a network file) all you have to do is click on the folder symbol at the left of the address bar and the path is displayed:

The same breadcrumb trail appears in the save dialog and it's here I find it indespensible. No more navigating up and then down to adjacent folders, mostly it's one click away.

(Before everyone writes in, yes I know those are Vista and not Windows 7 screenshots above. I couldn't be bothered to go screenshot my Netbook right now either. Am I lazy today or what?!)

More soon!

I love my Wacom Cintiq as I loved my Intuos 3 tablet before it. When I first got the Cintiq I read a lot of comments from people who loved their new Cintiq so much they were immediately consigning their Intuos to eBay or FreeCycle (or - heaven forfend! - the trash), and this really bothered me as I dearly loved my Intuos setup which it had taken me ages to get just right. The Intuos is also a much bigger area than the Cintiq (I only got the little one) so as excited as I was didn't want to let it go. But being the 'have my cake AND eat it' kind of person that I am, I decided to keep both!

• Although Wacom don't advertise two tablets as being a viable option - it is! The same Wacom driver works for both devices and is happy to let you set them up with different settings.

  The Wacom control panel app allows you to setup the Cintiq and the Intuos independently which I've found really useful. I have my pen set up to work on the cintiq screen area only (because you point at the screen to use it - you may need think about this for a second if you don't have a Cintiq of your own) but as soon as I move that same pen onto the Intuos tablet it gives me immediate access the entire desktop area across all three monitors - great for multi-tasking as I don't need to go scrabbling for my mouse. Also within Photoshop you only pull just the workspace area onto the Cintiq, leaving all the other controls, history palette, layers palette etc back on your main monitor. Ordinarily to access those settings the Cintiq comes with a monitor switching button but I don't use this as I find it interupts my workflow too much - as does scrabbling for the mouse. What's great about having my old Intuos right alongside the Cintiq is that every time I need to change color or function in one of the palettes in Photoshop I can do it with the same pen just by moving it onto the Intuos.

• The button layout on the Cintiq is similar to the Intuous so by having both I doubled the number of buttons. If you use the default button layout for Photoshop it is mainly modifier keys, which I don't find that useful. So I've always set it up to change functions in Photoshop which lets me work faster. In order to use the Cintiq I have to pull it into my keyboard's normal position on the desktop, so functions that would once have best been performed by shortcut keys (for example, b for brush, d for default, x to swap colors etc etc) are more difficult. Having twice the number of buttons between the Cintiq and the Intuos is therefore very useful!
  Here's my button layout with the Cintiq on the left and Intous on the right as it appears on my desk when I'm working. I realize the button setup is a very personal thing, so this is what works for me, yours would be different, but it demonstrates the benefits of using both tablets together.
  
• The pens for the Intuos work on the Cintiq which is good as it doubled my pens straightaway. Voila double the settings options!

A couple of days ago I was asked by Gordon Robb about my Cintiq post the following question

"...how does the cintiq connect if you already have two monitors. I have this setup, but my graphics card only has two outputs, so where would the cintiqu go? This is the only thing stopping me buying it."

Thanks for your question Gordon. My solution is two dual output graphics cards (ATI Radeon 4800 series). This allows me to have my two main monitors and the Cintiq as an auxiliary. Because my deskspace is limited I'm not in a position to use the Cintiq as a third monitor all the time but on rare occasions when three screens have come in very handy. I use ultramon to handle my existing dual monitor setup and it can handle the Cintiq as a third monitor just fine.