Hi Charles,
I have an Intuos 3 tablet and I never use a mouse again. Working with a tablet takes some getting used too but it pays of in the end. It definatly solves the tendonitis issues (I am guessing you mean the carpal tunnel syndrome (arm and wrist pain)).
With a little practise you can even use the tablet for autocad, sketchup and illustrator purposes. The simpler tablets like Bamboo will probably work fine (its from Wacom so it can’t be too bad). I do prefer the larger drawing space of the Intuos to the very small one of the Bamboo. The bamboo will probably be fine for a beginning tablet user like yourself.
