Wacom announce the modular Surface Studio Microsoft should have made

The Surface Studio is very cool, but $3000 for a core i5 processor and 8 GB of RAM does not exactly say professional artist. The most annoying thing about the Surface Studio is that the PC is underpowered but permanently welded to the screen, meaning there is no way to upgrade to a more powerful PC besides buying an upgraded device, something which is not even yet available.

If you care more about productivity than looks, Wacom has a new product for you which addresses the very issue.

Today Wacom announced the Wacom Cintiq Pro Engine, a creative PC module available in two configurations that fully integrates into the Cintiq Pro 24-inch pen display. Designed for professional illustrators, designers, engineers and motion graphics users who require professional computing power and graphics performance, the modular Cintiq Pro Engine slots into the back of the Cintiq Pro 24, eliminating the space, cable clutter and compatibility issues that often result from using external computers and laptops.

“It is our mission to help professionals create with the least amount of distraction and clutter and to give them the power to tackle the new spaces of creating content for AR, VR and MR. The Wacom Cintiq Pro Engine provides a beautiful, easy to use solution for creatives everywhere,” said Faik Karaoglu, Executive Vice President of the Creative Business Unit at Wacom.

Attaching the Cintiq Pro Engine to the Cintiq Pro 24 transforms the Cintiq Pro 24 into a full Windows 10 creative studio that supports even the most demanding programs and applications used by creative professionals. The combination of the Wacom Cintiq Pro display, the powerful Wacom Cintiq Pro Engine creative PC module, and a flexible and rotatable new Wacom Ergo Stand is an innovative approach to providing an all-in-one specialized working environment for creatives. Adding the use of the Wacom Pro Pen 3D, professionals who rely on 3D animation or sculpting software, or CAD applications, will see an immediate benefit to their workflow.

Powerful Graphics
The Wacom Cintiq Pro Engine is powered by the NVIDIA Quadro P3200, powerful enough for ful VR support. This graphics card is based on the NVIDIA Pascal GPU architecture, which provides the power demanded by today’s creative applications with dramatically faster graphics and computing power than on the CPU. “Wacom designs products for the way artists and designers create. They’re intuitive, natural and fast and can be used anywhere,” says Bob Pette, vice president, Professional Visualization, NVIDIA. “Our new mobile Quadro P3200 packs a ton of graphics power into the new Cintiq and Cintiq Engine Pro, and we’re thrilled to have them showcased at our upcoming GPU Technology Conference.”

Flexibility Found Nowhere Else
The Wacom Cintiq Pro Engine memory and SSD are exchangeable and upgradable, ensuring system flexibility. Given the plug and play nature of the hardware, it’s easy to move between Cintiq 32″ and 24″ displays while retaining the same computing environment with the Cintiq Pro Engine. This flexibility is found nowhere else in the market and leads to a lower total cost of ownership (TCO) than any other solution.

Two Versions of Cintiq Pro Engine

Cintiq Pro Engine i5:

• Operating System: Windows 10 Pro
• Processor: Intel® Core i5HQ (Quad Core)
• Graphics: NVIDIA® Quadro® P3200
• Dedicated graphics memory: 6GB GDDR5
• RAM: 16GB
• Storage: 256GB SSD, PCIe Gen3
• Wireless LAN: Wi-Fi IEEE 802.11 ac
• Bluetooth: Bluetooth® 4.2
• Security: fTPM(TPM2.0)
• Input Voltage: 100 to 240 VAC, 50/60 Hz
• Connectivity: Internal (communication between PC & Display) 1x USB-C, 1x Power
• Connectivity: External (customer interfaces) 1x RJ45 (LAN), 2x USB-C, 1xmHDMI, 1xmDP, 2x DC-in
• Price: $2,499

Cintiq Pro Engine Xeon:

• Operating System: Windows 10 Pro for Workstation
• Processor: Intel® XEON
• Graphics: NVIDIA® Quadro® P3200
• Dedicated graphics memory: 6GB GDDR5
• RAM: 32GB
• Storage: 512GB SSD, PCIe Gen3
• Wireless LAN: Wi-Fi IEEE 802.11 ac
• Bluetooth: Bluetooth®  4.2
• Security: fTPM(TPM2.0)
• Input Voltage: 100 to 240 VAC, 50/60 Hz
• Output Voltage: 19.5V/11.8A (230W)
• Connectivity: Internal (communication between PC & Display); 1x USB-C, 1x Power
• Connectivity: External (customer interfaces); 1x RJ45 (LAN), 2x USB-C, 1xmHDMI, 1xmDP, 2x DC-in
• Price: $3,299

Availability
There are two versions of Cintiq Pro Engine, available as of May 2018 in Japan, US and selected countries in Europe.

Read more about the range at Wacom here.