The development of a Windows 7 slate or tablet is job number one at Microsoft, chief executive Steve Ballmer said Thursday.

The development of a Windows 7 slate or tablet is job number one at Microsoft, chief executive Steve Ballmer said Thursday.

"We have got to make things happen" on slates, Ballmer said at the company's annual financial analyst meeting.

The successful launch of a Windows 7-branded slate is "job one urgency around here; nobody's sleeping at the switch," he said.

Rumors about a Microsoft "Courier" tablet emerged in September 2009, but that project was in April. Ballmer during his Consumer Electronic Show keynote this year. After rumors that that too had been shelved, the HP Slate , but HP has not released details about when it will be available for purchase.

Most tablet news has been overshadowed by . Ballmer said Apple has done an "interesting" job with the iPad. "They've sold more than I'd like them to sell; let me be clear about that," he said.

Tablet production has been "one of the top issues on my mind," Ballmer said.

Microsoft has done a lot of work on touch and ink recently, and now it's a matter of working with hardware partners to fine tune Windows 7 for their particular devices, he said. "You'll see us try to bring those things together over the course of the next months and beyond to really deliver the slates and convertibles that I think people will be excited about," he said.

Ballmer promised a boost early next year when for tablets and netbooks. This will allow for lower power consumption, lower noise levels, and lighter weight devices, he said.

"As focused as we are in this category, our partners are also focused on the systems and the chips that will enable our architecture to continue and our software product to continue to move on," Ballmer said.

He declined to discuss exact specifications, since "no one size that fits all" when it comes to tablets. Different customers are going to want different features, he said.

"We're working to deliver products that people really want to go buy," he said.

These products will be available "as soon as we can," Ballmer said. "I'm going to wait until I have the device that I want to hand you and tell you to go use."

Brad Brooks with the Windows team later demoed Windows Live on an un-named tablet. He also discussed the concept of a "personal cloud" and said it will allow every Windows device to connect to the same information over the Web.

"I don't want to just be able to share content on my Personal Cloud, I want to be able to manage it and interact with it," Brooks said. "It is going to connect and bring new relationships to me."

Ballmer, meanwhile, also touched on , and how Microsoft is looking to attract new customers. He addressed concerns that offering a free, Web-based version of Office will drive people away from paying for Microsoft software.

"People will pay with their own money for things that make them more productive," Ballmer said. "At the same time, people are willing to pirate, [but] our number one opportunity in Office is to broaden out the number of people who are exposed and then choose to pay."

Having a low-cost option, as well as pre-loading trial versions of Office on PCs makes Ballmer "optimistic about potential revenue growth."

Earlier this month, NPD Group said that , but the firm attributed this to the fact that Office 2010 was not a radical re-design and it was not released in tandem with a major OS launch, like Office 2007 was with Vista.

Ballmer also touted the success of Xbox. He declined to comment on how well Microsoft's upcoming gaming sensor will perform over the holiday season, except to say "I like where we are."

On Bing, Ballmer touted the work Microsoft has done on mobile search. "I think we've done some of the very best work that anybody's done to make search relevant and interesting in the mobile world," he said.

Ballmer was running short on time, and skipped an in-depth look at Windows Phone 7, but said that "phones are going to get a big push" at Microsoft in advance of the new mobile platform's debut later this year.

He also ribbed Google for that look a lot like Bing.

"I was flattered to see our visual differentiation has been a source of concern to Google," Ballmer said. "I like to see them emulating us in some way. I guess that's a form of flattery."

Ballmer also said Microsoft will be opening several more retail stores in the Oakbrook Center near Chicago, at the Mall of America in Minneapolis, and in Bellevue Square in Washington state.