By Simon Hamilton
Canada-based Research In Motion has announced that its upcoming product, the Blackberry PlayBook will launch in the US and Canada on April 19th. The device was unveiled by Mike Lazaridis, president and co-CEO of Research in Motion (RIM), during the BlackBerry developers conference 2010 in San Francisco.

RIM announced that the Playbook will go on sale in the UK in Q2 this year, between April and June. The RIM device will include a 1GHz dual-core processor, 7” 1024x600 WSVGA capacitive LCD touch screen. It will run Blackberry Tablet OS. The device will sport dual cameras capable of recording full 1080p footage.

The BlackBerry PlayBook with Wi-Fi will come in three models, featuring 16GB, 32GB or 64GB of storage. The models will be priced at $499, $599 and $699 respectively. "Previews of the BlackBerry PlayBook have generated tremendous excitement and we know that customers are eager to get their hands on one," said RIM's regional managing director for North America, Craig McLennan. The Blackberry Tablet OS is designed especially for the device and is a new OS. According to RIM, the OS will allow the users to share information like email, BBM and address book contacts wirelessly between a Blackberry phone and the PlayBook.

The device is pretty light at 0.9 lbs (425g). Its dimensions are 5.1" x 7.6" x 0.4."
The device has MP3, AAC and WMA audio playback and support for high resolution video playback (H.264, MPEG4, WMV). It has 1 GB RAM memory and up to 64 GB internal storage (16, 32 and 64 GB models). The Playbook has GPS, Orientation Sensor (Accelerometer), 6-Axis Motion Sensor (Gyroscope), Digital Compass (Magnetometer).