Steve Ballmer hailed the reception of Windows 7 during his opening keynote at the 2010 CES in Las Vegas, saying that the PC was the ultimate converged device.

Calling 2010 "the biggest year in Xbox history" Robbie Bach, President of Entertainment and Devices at Microsoft, also announced that Natal would definitely be ready for this Christmas – though he didn't say how much it would cost despite talking up the new technology in the extreme.

Bach also showed a trailer for Halo: Reach, out in the Autumn.

During his talk, which was delayed by a power cut at the Las Vegas Hilton, Ballmer highlighted Microsoft's success this year, starting with the latest sales numbers on Windows 7, and showcased some of the innovative new hardware manufacturers continue to roll out.

Ballmer started by referring to the tough economic climate – "2009 really was a year of unprecedented economic turbulence" – but said he believed the tech industry was strong and had kept going.

Ballmer said that PC sales jumped nearly 50 per cent the week Windows 7 launched while according to NPD, the 2009 holiday season saw greater than 50 percent year-over-year growth for Windows PC sales. "The results speak for themselves," said Ballmer, dedicating the figures to the work of 3,000 Microsoft workers and 8 million beta testers.

Ballmer noted that Gartner now believes PC sales for 2009 were up 3 per cent – it previously belived there would be falling figures.

As for Bing, Ballmer revealed that in the few months following its introduction in June, Bing had added 11 million new users and grown market share (though quite how much wasn't specified).

More than 39 million Xbox 360s have been sold while nearly 10 million people have logged into Xbox LIVE's nongaming applications — Facebook, Twitter, Netflix, Last.fm, Sky, Canal and Zune — using their Xbox as a way to stay connected to friends and family.