We're sure everyone remembers the Microsoft Courier, the much-anticipated though ultimately cancelled dual-screen tablet. The idea was an intriguing one - two screens and an operating system that utilized both pen and gesture inputs. It was funky, but Microsoft said they could never put it into production and a little bit of every geek on the planet died along with it. If only our iPads could recreate some of that magic.
Now things are taking a U-turn again, or sort of anyway. If you thought that Microsoft has buried the Courier project somewhere in their labs, you might be wrong, as it now looks like that some parts of that ambitious Courier project may return in the upcoming Tablets from Microsoft. Recently, Bill Gates in an interview said that Microsoft is working on Tablets which would use a pen-based input method (as opposed to finger-only mechanism in Apple iPad) which would go mainstream in students.
Sad news for quite a lot of people, including us. The Microsoft Courier Tablet won’t go into production and has been confirmed by Microsoft itself that they’re pulling the plug on the Courier Tablet project.
A trusted source has informed Engadget about the upcoming Microsoft's Courier tablet/e-book device which was first surfaced back in September last year. With just under an inch thickness and weighing a little over a pound, Courier is designed to function as a "Digital Journal". It is going to feature a dual 7-inch multitouch capable screen which will be designed to work with both multiple fingers-input and stylus.
The are a number of rumored reports around the web, suggesting a possible announcement of Microsoft Courier Tablet like Slate tablet PC tonight during Steve Ballmer’s opening keynote at 2010 CES. If this happens, then we could very well have a Slate/Tablet PC, running Microsoft software well ahead of Apple’s rumored iSlate/Tablet, which is expected to be unveiled on January 27th, in Apple’s mega event to be held at Yerba Buena Center for the Arts in San Francisco.
The rumors about the release of Apple’s long awaited Tablet has been on fire for the last few days and so are the speculations about its name. A day earlier, we informed you that Apple had secretly purchased the domain "iSlate.com" back in 2007. Domain was registered through some intermediary by the name ‘Markmonitor.com’ to disguise the real owner. You can check out the screenshot of that registration form which we have posted here.
