London - Google is planning to kill Apple's mobile computing device, the iPad and has revealed what a Chrome-based tablet could look like and feature.

Two days before Apple revealed its 9.7-inch touchscreen-based iPad to the world, Google posted up mock-up photos and a video of its concept tablet on the official Chromium website (www.chromium.org), the open source project behind the Google Chrome browser and Google Chrome OS, for developers to consider.

While the mock-up photos show a variety of Chrome OS tablet ideas, including a virtual keyboard taking up the bottom half of the screen or detached and floating as a separate window; a slideshow mode; an application launcher; sidebar-mounted browser tabs; and a pop-up contextual menu, the video mock-up shows a much larger tablet, with hands resizing and moving windows through the multitouch interface, scrolling through text, and typing a search query.

Though Google refused to disclose whether the Chrome-based tablet could soon be a reality, the message was clear - a multitouch-enabled version of the Chrome OS could become a reality in the near future.

"Google Chrome OS is still in development, and we are constantly experimenting with various user interfaces to determine what designs would produce the best user experience. As we've said all along, the UI is still under development and will continue to evolve as we determine which designs work best for our users," Google said in a statement.

Another message was clear - unlike the iPad, which runs on iPhone OS and can't multitask, a Chrome OS-based tablet will be able to handle multitasking.

However, if you're wondering whether this is the first time Google and Apple could be facing off, the answer is 'no.' In the past, Google launched its open source-based Android OS for mobile devices to rival Apple's proprietary iPhone OS. Last month, the internet search engine giant also launched its very own Android-powered smartphone Nexus One to rival iPhone. And, if Google does launch its own tablet, it probably will tap third party hardware manufacturers.

As for why Google is focusing on Chrome OS and not Android OS to run tablets, well, it's not surprising - in the big picture, Google clearly hopes the browser will be the foundation for applications, letting them run more easily on a multitude of devices.

As for Apple, it seems the technology giant has more than just Google to contend with. Other manufacturers - including HP, Lenovo and Dell - are also planning to launch tablet computers based on the Windows 7, Linux and Google Android operating systems in the near future.