Today, Engadget got their hands on some more mock-ups and some new videos of Microsoft's "Courier," that project lead by J Allard (MS's Chief Experience Officer). If it comes to fruition, it looks as groundbreaking as Project Natal. The new videos are noted for showing real-life situations on how useful the Courier could be for professionals. But honestly, the device tells its own story, making it very drool-worthy.

The sophisticated and intuitive e-Journal is much smaller than previously thought, coming in under 1 inch thick, weighing in a little over one pound and not much bigger than a 5 x 7 photo when closed. Names like "Infinite Journal" and "Page Stream" are tossed around as is the necessity of the Courier Pen, making this centered around hand-writing recognition (something we've seen mentioned earlier in regards to WP7).

The device is said to be developed on CE6, the same as Windows Phone 7 Series, which seems to be Microsoft's new toy to be used on everything. The big question we have is will this in any way interact or sync with Windows Phone 7? It would seem a no brainer to have something like that on board between the two platforms, but until we hear more...

Either way, 2010 is looking very good for Microsoft: Windows 7, Windows Phone 7 Series, Project Natal, Zune and now Courier. Anyone else getting excited?

Anyone else shocked we didn't take a chance to poke fun at the iPad in this post? Feel free to take up the torch for us in comments ;-)

Read more at Engadget and Gizmodo

If there's anything we love about trade shows like CES, it's when big surprises are dropped on us. And if The New York Times Bits blog is correct, well, we'll just let them tell it.

On Wednesday, Mr. (Steve) Ballmer, Microsoft’s chief executive, will unveil a novel take on a slate-type computer during his evening keynote at the Consumer Electronics trade show in Las Vegas, according to people familiar with Microsoft’s plans. The slate will be made by Hewlett-Packard and possibly available by mid-year, these people said.

Might this be the fabled Courier tablet, which Ballmer just a few months ago said he'd never seen (all be winking with his answer)? Only one way to find out. We'll be there live.

OK, so there's still no telling if Microsoft's rumored "Courier" project is real, or if it ever will see the light of day. But as a project, it's certainly gaining credibility with Gizmodo unearthing new details about how that slick interface works.

What's that have to do with Windows Mobile, you ask? Admittedly, not a whole lot. But it's another reason why we're expecting Windows Mobile 7 to not just be a new iteration of the operating system of yore. Also, tie it in with that mobile UI concept video we saw a while ago. (And if you want something more near-term, again, we'll point toward the Zune HD.) Even if the Courier never gets out of the concept stage, it shows that there are people thinking into the future. Now Microsoft has to let them loose.

Attention Amazon Kindle, Sony Reader, Apple Phantom Tablet, iPhone, iPod Touch, netbooks, laptops, Newtons, Palm Pilots, calculators, spiral-bound notebooks, loose-leaf paper, pen, pencil and life as we know it:

This. Is. The. Future.

By now you've probably seen Gizmodo's leak of Microsoft's Courier project. If not, take two 7-inch multitouch tablets, sandwich them together like a book, throw in a camera and amaze the heck out of technophiles everywhere.

We wanted to sleep on things and try to digest exactly what we'd seen. And, like everyone else, we're blown away. Surprised it's from Microsoft? Don't be. These are the guys (and gals) who brought us Microsoft Surface. And apologies for beating this drum yet again, but add the Zune HD to that list. Microsoft can do UI. It can do hardware. And it can marry the two.

That said, remember that this is far from a production run. Far, far from it, we imagine, though Giz says it's in the "late prototype" stage. And there's practically no way this couldn't be completely out of the price range of 99 percent of those who'd love to use one. (Right?) Please, please, Microsoft, prove us wrong.

Says Giz:

Until recently, it was a skunkworks project deep inside Microsoft, only known to the few engineers and executives working on it—Microsoft's brightest, like Entertainment & Devices tech chief and user-experience wizard J. Allard, who's spearheading the project. Currently, Courier appears to be at a stage where Microsoft is developing the user experience and showing design concepts to outside agencies.

Says us:

Wow.

Head on over to Giz and check out more pics and a stunning video, then head back here and let us know what you think.