With the news of Apple announcing a tablet in late January, everyone from the media and investors are starting to get excited about the possibilities, and the speculation is aplenty. Analyst Gene Munster from Piper Jaffray has estimated the number of total tablets that Apple will sell in the new year. Assuming a late January announcement and availability in March, Munster expects Apple to sell 162,000 devices per month at the yearly run rate of 2 million units. Since there will be no sales in the first quarter of the year, that number drops down to 1.4 million units from April to December.

“For purposes of sensitivity, assuming the tablet comes out in March 2010, we believe Apple would sell around 1.4 units at a $600 [average selling price] in 2010,” Munster writes in a note. “The tablet is not yet included in Street models, so we expect the multiple to expand as tablet hype builds ahead of the announcement, and numbers to go up once the device is announced.”

There you have it. The tablet isn’t even here yet, and we are looking at estimated sales figures already. For what it’s worth, we don’t think Apple will announce a $600 tablet. That’s a little low by Apple’s standards.