The good news: HP has finally decided to release the much-hyped HP Slate 500 on the market. The bad news: the tablet PC is going to have to sell a shedload of units before we get to see it on this side of the Atlantic.

Better late than never?

While some lucky folks got to try a prototype of the Slate way back in January, it’s been all quiet on the HP front regarding the product ever since then.

It will apparently be pitched a business professionals, targeting the type of folk who are weighing up the RIM PlayBook rather than the millions of potential iPad users out there. The specs show that there will be an Intel 1.86GHz Atom Z540 processor inside alongside a Graphics Media Accelerator 500 chip, 2GB of RAM and 64GB SSD.

The resolution of the 8.9-inch screen is 1024×600 and thanks to a Broadcom Crystal HD accelerator, it should play hi-def content without a hitch. There are also two cameras on the HP Slate 500 – a VGA on the front and a 3MP camera on the rear.

As TechRadar notes, the tablet also makes use of a Wacom active digitizer, so the device is primed for note taking and it uses Windows 7 as its OS. The HP Slate 500 will be available first from the US for $599.

As for customers on this side of the world – well we’ve been told that the Slate will be “evaluated for further market expansion”, which essentially means that unless a nice, juicy profit margin is starting to appear after a few months of sales we can forget about seeing it any time soon.