U.S. Cellular to launch eight smartphones, two tablets by end of 2011

Sprint isn't the only one ramping up its lineup today. U.S. Cellular just announced its product road map for the remainder of the year, and it includes eight smartphones and two tablets.

Seven of the eight handsets will run Android 2.3 Gingerbread and the eighth will be the carrier's first Windows Phone 7 handset. One of the models among the group will also be U.S. Cellular's first 4G LTE smartphone, due out in November.

HTC will provide four of the devices, beginning with the Windows Phone handset due out this summer. This will be followed by two Android phones and a 7-inch tablet in the fall. Meanwhile, Motorola is set to provide a dual-core, 4.3-inch smartphone with world-roaming capabilities (hmm, sounds an awful lot like a phone we saw today). Meanwhile, LG's kicking in one of the "slimmest and lightest" mobiles, complete with a 7-inch touch screen and 1GHz processor. Both the Motorola and LG devices are expected to ship in the fall.

Also on tap, two entry-level smartphones from Samsung and Huawei, as well as two QWERTY-equipped messaging phones from Samsung.

U.S. Cellular customers, you must be excited by this news, no?