iSlate Hacked

At the Consumer Electronics Show in January, Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer introduced his new touch-screen, tablet-style computer from Hewlett-Packard.  This is what Steve Ballmer had to say about his HP Slate.  “We’re talking about something that is almost as portable as a phone and as powerful as a PC running Windows 7.”  “The emerging category of PCs really should take advantage of the touch and mobility and capabilities of Windows 7, and are perfect, perfect for reading, for surfing the Web, and for taking entertainment on the go.”
A Hewlett-Packard spokesperson  confirmed that the unnamed ’slate’ PC demonstrated by Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer, “was not a current entry in the TouchSmart series being demonstrated to consumers by HP at the show this week. Rather, it’s a completely new product that will likely have a new brand and a special campaign, and its availability is only being slated for “this year.”
Microsoft also has said it has a new search distribution deal with HP that will make the Bing search site and MSN.com content portal the default search engine and Web home page on new HP computers sold in 42 countries.
The Hp Slate is a one-piece portable computer without a keyboard, this device seemed to be singled out by Steve Ballmer in his display of Microsoft’s new products hitting the market this year.
A product announcement could be coming as soon as August of this year.  At this point no official specs or graphics have been displayed, no idea on the price either.  All that is known at this point is that this device will be in direct competition with the iPad that was announced and displayed January 27th, this will give Microsoft the time to fill in the gaps with their HP Slate, that the iPad / iSlate might be missing.