An 80-inch touchscreen Windows 8 tablet already hangs on the wall of Microsoft CEO’s Steve Ballmer - and it could soon be made available to the public.

This is according to Frank Shaw, Microsoft vice-president, talking to Nate Lanxon, editor of Wired.co.uk, who said of Ballmer’s giant tablet added: “He’s got rid of his phone, he’s got rid of his notepaper. It’s [the tablet)] his whiteboard, his email machine, and it’s a device we’re going to sell.”

Interestingly the current version of the device - the one that hangs on Ballmer’s wall - runs on Windows 8 it but is actually made by a different manufacturer.

With the current big-hitters of the tablet world – the Toshiba Excite 13 - sporting displays that measure a comparatively meagre 13.3-inchs, an 80-incher is quite literally a huge leap. It’s certainly not going to be something you lug around with you. 

Which explains why Microsoft won’t be targeting the consumer, initially at least, seeing it serving more as a corporate functioning device. However, make no mistake, Microsoft sees this technology as the future.

"The idea that there should be a screen that's not a computer, we'll laugh at that in two years. Every screen should be touch, every screen should be a computer and should be able to see out as well as see in. That is the way the world is heading [and] those screens are going to be big, small, wall-sized and desk-sized."

Microsoft was unwilling to provide an arrival date on the 80-inch tablet device, though we’ll at least get to feast on what Windows 8 has in store when a release preview arrives in early June.

What do you make of the possibility of an 80-inch Windows 8 tablet? Let us know what you think.