Ballmer Reveals HP Slate in Speech, Microsoft Courier Still MIA

By Dena Cassella January 7, 2010

Hopes were high as Microsoft’s Steve Ballmer took the stage to give his keynote speech—a new tablet would be announced and tech-lovers everywhere crossed their fingers for the Microsoft Courier’s debut. Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer did not divulge any new secrets about the illusive concept tablet, a dual-screen device that folds up like a book, but he did introduce three tablet computers running the touch-enabled Windows 7.

The tablets were built by Hewlett-Packard Co. (HP), Asus spinoff Pegatron, and media player maker Archos. Ballmer and HP were pretty tight lipped about pricing and specs for the HP slate, but Ballmer did give a quick demo in which he pulled up Twilight on the tablet’s Amazon Kindle application. The tablet immediately displayed the cover of the teenage-vampire love story—a pair of hands cradling an apple—nice one Steve.

The HP prototype slate is said to be arriving later this year and Ballmer’s keynote, in its entirety, can be seen at Microsoft’s CES Web site. Check out the product clip.

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