Since my wife is a professional illustrator (http://www.organ-kean.com) and since I've seen her staring longingly at the various Cintiq's at the San Diego ComicCon each year, I've been working towards making her a tablet since the budget just doesn't support getting a commercial one right now--she bought a non-Wacom tablet when she got her first graphics system, but it was so annoying to use that she sold it.  After I stumbled onto Drew's original build log I decided I could give this a try: if it worked with her drawing style and she liked it I would be a good supportive husband, and if she didn't I could flog it to some graphic artist somewhere who might like it.

After some time haunting surplus computer stores I managed to find three UD1212's for extremely cheap (two of which like Macs, and one of which decidedly does not), and was able to find another on Craigslist that wasn't quite so cheap but which had the pen and cables included.  My next step was to find a monitor.  After looking over the Lumenlabs database and what was available locally in my price range I found a Westinghouse LCM-15v5, which was listed as an extremely easy strip.  I bought it, then found what I thought would be an ideal case for it that was affordable and ordered a piece of tempered glass to fit the case.  When the glass arrived, I started my tear-down of the various bits.

Unfortunately, while the LCM-15v5 may be ideal for someone who's building a projection TV and only needs the screen, we need a backlight assembly, and the one on this monitor is so thick there is no way on the earth or under the sun that the Wacom is going to be able to sense what happens on the screen.  While I know that LED strips are a possible replacement, the prices I've seen so far on eBay are more than I paid for the monitor, assuming I need to use them on both sides of the screen.  So I'm back on the monitor search--too bad, because the LCM-15v5 looks great!

Oh, and the case and tempered glass?  Well, the Wacom sensor board won't fit it so I'm going to have to look at getting another case and joining the two together--it'll look slick, but the hassle is annoying, and I now have an extra piece of tempered glass.  I'll document the case stuff with pictures, of course, but I'm annoyed that all the disassembly shots I just took of the Westinghouse are for naught.  So, it's been a fun Sunday.  How about you all?

Claymonkey:

I'd rather avoid swapping chips if necessary: I have one tablet not working and three working and would hate to end up with 2 and 2.  I may try swapping the control boards soon.  As far as the power supply and the cables go, I only have the one set: it works fine on the other three tables which leads me to assume the cabling is correct.

Clqymonkey:

After working with a nice gent from Wacom, who checked if there were any replacement parts available (there aren't), after setting up an OS 9 Mac to use the Wacom software (no change), and after opening up the tablet and checking the contacts I found something that may be a possible explanation: Wacom hasn't given me an opinion one way or the other on this one, so it's just theory at this point.  What I found is that there's a ROM difference between the tablets: the ones that work show the model and ROM version ~#UD-1212-R00 V1.2-0 and the one that doesn't shows ~#UD-1212-R00 V1.1-1.  So this tablet may work fine for someone with a Windows setup, for example, but the V1.1-1 ROM seems to truly hate Macs.  If I could find someone who wants to swap tablets we'd know for sure...

iRoc:

The power adaptor and serial cables work perfectly on three other tablets.  It's something about this one, not the cabling.

I recently bought three 1212R's from a supplier without pens, cables, or power supplies in the hopes I could get at least one of them working.  The other day someone on Craigslist in my area offered a complete 1212R setup for less than I could get the pen for so I bought it as well.  It turns out that three of the tablets work perfectly using Tablet Magic on my Mac, but the fourth skips all over the screen when I try to move the cursor with the pen.  Before I consign this 1212R to the junkpile does anyone know what might be causing this and what I could do to take care of the problem?  I've tried many of the settings in the Testing screen of Tablet Magic with no success: self-test works, but when I move the pen it looks like the pad is connecting and disconnecting at a rapid rate.  That would explain why it skips but I don't know what steps to take to eliminate the problem...

Posting the third.

Posting the second.

Hello!  My wife is a professional artist, so when I stumbled into three Wacom UD1212R tablets (no pens or cables, unfortunately) I thought I'd build her a tablet with screen since I could barely pry her away from the Wacom Cintiq and Modbook booths at San Diego ComicCon.  I will be picking up a Westinghouse LCM-15v5 later today, and as soon as I can come up with a power cable and pen for the Wacom I will start a build log--I can't start until I know if any of these tablets are in working condition.  While I haven't seen any build logs for this monitor the LumenLab LCD Monitor Database says "Great LCD, strips easily, AG does as well. High contrast, no ghosting" which makes me hopeful--ideally it will be jitter-free as well.