Photos: The very latest crop of tablet PCs

See the devices that are fuelling the hype...

At the Consumer Electronics Show (CES), which took place in Las Vegas last week, one of the trends making the biggest waves was the advent of the tablet PC.

CES saw a flurry of new devices announced as their makers hoped to entice gadget buyers to part with their money.

silicon.com has brought together some of the most interesting tablet devices unveiled at and before the show.

HP Slate

The HP Slate device, shown here, made its first appearance during Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer's keynote at CES.

The device is due to be released later in the year and runs Windows 7. Further details on the Slate are non-existent, but Ballmer's demo certainly got the technorati excited.

Photo credit: HP

Lenovo Ideapad U1 Hybrid

Rather than a straightforward tablet, this nifty Lenovo device offers two form factors in one: a laptop and a detachable slate PC.

When working as a netbook, the device runs Windows 7. Once the tablet is separated from the main body of the machine, it uses a more lightweight OS - Lenovo's own Linux-based Skylight operating system.

Photo credit: Lenovo

Here you can see how the U1's screen detaches from the rest of the device to become a separate tablet PC.

Photo credit: Lenovo

Asus EeePC T101MT

Asus effectively started the netbook craze with the launch of the original Eee PC in 2007, and the company is now looking at what it can do with the tablet side of things.

The T101MT features a twistable 10-inch display, and offers multitouch input through its resistive touchscreen.

Photo credit: Asus

Dell Mini 5

Dell unveiled this teeny-tiny tablet PC called the Mini 5 at CES.

The five-inch tablet comes with a multitouch display and uses a Dell customised version of Google's Android OS.

The Mini 5 includes a camera, wi-fi, Bluetooth and 3G connectivity. The device is still at concept stage, however.

Photo credit: Dell

Archos 9 PCtablet

Archos has been making mobile media devices for some time and in October last year the company launched the Archos 9 PCtablet. The device runs on Windows 7 and has a nine-inch resistive touchscreen with virtual keyboard.

It allows users to watch HD video and has a 60GB hard drive with access to a further 25GB of online storage.

The device also features a stand so you can sit back and watch videos or photo slideshows.

Photo credit: Archos