Microsoft Announces Courier – Personal Journal & E-Reader Device

In the post-Vista era, Microsoft has done a lot of good in order to win back the trust of its fans, or at least regular users of its software, thanks mostly to the very successful Windows 7 launch. Not long after that OS launch, we were impressed once again with the announcement of Windows Phone 7. Well, it looks like “Courier” is the next possible reason to be impressed.

At first, I wondered if this could be a potential “iPad Killer”, but the truth is, both devices are targeting two different sets of people, and have different goals. While the iPad focus a bit more on getting work done and watching the occasional video (not to mention get some gaming done), the Courier from Microsoft looks to be the ultimate personal journal… which of course means, no paper.

Like the Nintendo DS, the Courier has dual screens, but are situated left-to-right (top to bottom might be possible at launch, however), and you use it mostly as a personal journal. You can keep notes, write down appointments, and do anything important that a journal is meant for. But on top of it, you can also store and manage photos, browse the Web and so on. The device has simple goals, but after you take a look at the promotional video (found at the link below), you can see that the UI design is quite intuitive and rich as well.

In addition to offering a robust-looking OS and lots of functionality, the device also includes a camera and earphone jack. It’s unknown how well this device will handle video, but as its based on NVIDIA’s Tegra 2 platform, it can’t be all too bad. As the title for this news post suggests, Microsoft is using Courier to double as its e-reader platform, and from that standpoint, it looks quite good. Of course, Courier’s success is going to be somewhat dependant on pricing, so it will be interesting to see what it will debut at when it officially launches later this year.

We’re told Courier will function as a “digital journal,” and it’s designed to be seriously portable: it’s under an inch thick, weighs a little over a pound, and isn’t much bigger than a 5×7 photo when closed. That’s a lot smaller than we expected — this new picture really puts it into perspective — and the internals apparently reflect that emphasis on mobility: rather than Windows 7, we’re told the Courier is built on Tegra 2 and runs on the same OS as the Zune HD, Pink, and Windows Mobile 7 Series, which we’re taking to mean Windows CE 6