Making the Intuos4 work with Windows 8 and Adobe Photoshop CS5

The pain of early Windows 8 adoption continued with the realization that my Wacom Intuos4 tablet no longer appeared to be functioning properly from within Adobe Photoshop CS5.  Specifically, the pressure sensitive features on the brush no longer seemed to have an effect, and there was this annoying little "radar blip" that would form every time the pen would touch the surface of the Intuos.

A little online digging revealed this is a known issue, and apparently has something to do with the new pen tablet functionality integrated into the Win8 OS.  While Wacom works on a proper driver patch, implementing the steps below (pulled from here and here) followed by a reboot seemed to do the trick.  Note that these involve a few registry hacks, so the usual disclaimers apply about bricking your box if you step on a landmine while in the registry...

• Create the following keys using regedit.exe

[HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Policies\Microsoft\TabletPC]
"TurnOffPenFeedback"=dword:00000000
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Policies\Microsoft\TabletPC]
"TurnOffPenFeedback"=dword:00000000

• Modify group policy (GPEdit.msc) to disable dynamic pen options

User Configurations\Administrative Templates\Windows Components\TabletPC
Cursors- Turn off pen feedback set to "Enable"
Hardware buttons - Prevent Press and Hold set to "Enable"

• Modify the Control Panel | Pen and Touch settings

Ensure that 'Press and Hold | Right Click' is checked/enabled. Set the speed
to the longest possible setting (all the way right) and the duration to shortest setting (all the way left). Do not the disable press and hold setting, as you will get lag dragging and scrolling.

• Modify the Control Panel | Wacom Tablet Properties settings

Ensure that under Options, the Side Switch Mode is set to Hover Click.

• Modify the following keys using regedit.exe

[HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Control Panel\Cursors]
Modify the key ContactVisualisation from 1 to 0
Modify the key GestureVisualisation from 1F (31) to 0

After applying the steps above, the tablet now appears to be behaving properly...