HP ‘iPad Killer’ Slate Details Leaked: $549 Keyboard-less Netbook

At height of the tablet revolution, once again the mysterious HP Slate appears, this time bringing some leaked info to the blogosphere.  An apparent leaked internal document from HP show us what this “iPad Killer” is up against.  Just a few hours after HP unveiled its latest video telling us almost nothing about the company’s upcoming slate PC, the folks at Engadget got their hands on a possibly leaked document outlining the tablet’s specs.

Just like the iPad, the Slate is really the only other tablet that has nearly as much hype surrounding it.  The upcoming HP Slate looks promising.  It’s a true laptop replacement running a Windows 7, so that means it will be running Adobe Flash just like any other full-featured netbook, laptop, or desktop.

The leaked internal HP memo which compares the upcoming Slate to Apple’s iPad shows not just the specifications of the Hewlett Packard tablet, but also the price.

HP Slate Leaked Specs:

The Slate will come in two sizes: a 32GB model for $549 and a $599, 64GB version. This compares favorably to the iPad, which costs $599 for 32GB. On the “advantages” side, the HP lists an SD card reader, a USB port, HDMI-out, a VGA webcam, a 3MP camera, and a “conventional” SIM-card tray (the iPad uses the new micro-SIM).

So basically HP’s yet-to-be-named slate computer features a 1.6 GHz Intel Atom processor, an 8.9-inch, multi-touch display, 32 or 64 GB of Flash storage, and 1 GB of DDR RAM. HP’s slate also runs on Windows Home 7 Premium, includes a VGA Webcam, and an Intel UMA graphics chip that supports 1080p, high-definition video playback.

The leak follows Monday’s official release of a brief video highlighting some of the features of HP’s slate, which the company hopes will help the Windows computing market steal some thunder from Apple’s iPad. The 30-second video packs in a good bit of detail. It appears to show that HP’s slate has a built-in video camera, USB ports, support for SD cards, music player software, and direct integration with social media and file-sharing sites like Facebook and Flickr.

The questions that have yet to be answered either by HP or by rumors are mainly around what software it will feature and how exactly Windows 7 will be customized to work on the slate (though the slide does mention “HP touch-optimized UI”).

Unlike the iPad, HP’s slate will also support Adobe’s Flash multimedia format. Meanwhile, HP is staying mum over other reports its slate computer will ship in the fall. Numerous blogs, citing a report last month on the Spanish tech site Clipset.com, said HP’s slate will debut in the U.S. in September. But a company spokesperson was quick to dismiss the stories as “speculative.”

Those are the unofficial details, anyway. The company would only confirm that the tablet would be out this year, would be running Microsoft’s latest and greatest, and will cost you less than $1,500.