Looking for a little bit of Android-powered productivity? LG's new G Pad X 8.3 tablet ($299.99) is designed for work. While LG had to make some performance compromises to get the price under $300, its combination of USB peripheral support and Verizon's 4G LTE network means it could be a compelling midrange tablet for Microsoft Office and Google Docs use. That said, you'll get a lot more in a tablet if you pay a little more, and I think investing in a productivity tablet is worth it.
Physical Design and Networking
Measuring 8.53 by 4.98 by 0.34 inches (HWD) and weighing 13 ounces, the G Pad X 8.3 ($129.99 at Verizon) is definitely attractive, if a bit generic. The front is your usual black slab, with purely virtual Android action buttons. The back has some personality, with a dark gray metal inlay and a soft-touch black plastic surround. The 8.3-inch 1,920-by-1,200-pixel LCD is sharp, shows good colors and viewing angles, and isn't too reflective.
Two of the G Pad's unique features are a full-sized USB port on top and a stylus at the bottom. That USB port can really boost productivity: I checked, and it supports mice, keyboards, USB flash drives, and even hubs. Popping in a USB flash drive automatically opens the file manager. Get a good stand, load up Google Docs or Microsoft Office, and you've got a full workstation.
The G Pad X 8.3 is an LTE-only tablet, according to the carrier—there's no 3G fallback. It's only compatible with LTE bands 4 and 13, so it'll work fine with Verizon but it won't roam internationally. I tested its LTE speeds against a Motorola Droid Turbo and found the G Pad X 8.3 was capable of catching a strong signal and delivering good speeds, usually at least 20 percent faster than the phone. The tablet also supports 802.11a/b/g/n on the 2.4GHz and 5GHz bands, and it has Bluetooth 4.1 and GPS, but not NFC.
Similar Products
Nvidia Shield Tablet (32GB, LTE)
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Performance and Multimedia
The G Pad X 8.3 upgrades the Qualcomm Snapdragon 400 processor you see in a lot of lower-end tablets to a Snapdragon 615 running at 1.5GHz and 2GB of RAM. It benchmarked well, but performance still felt sluggish, in part because of an underpowered GPU that churned out only 5.4 frames per second onscreen in our GFXBenchmark Manhattan test. Resource-intensive games like Asphalt 8 definitely suffer. Office apps and keyboard input didn't lag, though, and the tablet has dual-window multitasking and a Slimport micro USB port to output to TVs and projectors.
In addition to the somewhat sluggish performance, I also experienced some issues with the tablet's touch screen. It suffered from frequent "ghost touches," popping down the notifications panel when I didn't actually touch it. And the built-in stylus is a great idea, but suffers from significant lag, including in LG's built-in QuickMemo+ app. (It's also passive and not pressure sensitive.)
The bloatware covering Android 5.0.1 here isn't too bad, at least compared with the LG G4 ($456.00 at Verizon) phone. Yes, it's still LG, so all of the icons have been changed and you can still wake the tablet up by knocking sharply on the screen. I counted 11 apps that Verizon has forced onto this tablet, lowering the 16GB of built-in storage to 9.32GB of usable space. There's a microSD card slot and that USB port, though, so it's expandable.
The G Pad X 8.3 has an 8-megapixel main camera and a 2-megapixel front camera. Both cameras capture 1080p video, and they're both good for tablet cameras. The main camera is sharp in good lighting, although the front-facing camera has an over-sharpened, grainy aspect to it. Neither camera works particularly well in low light, with the front-facing camera becoming laughably smeary and blurry, but few tablets perform well in low light. Video recording frame rates also drop to 24fps in lower light.
The tablet's two back-ported speakers are very loud, but hideously tinny. Of course, you'll probably be listening with headphones, where the music sounds fine. LG's music app also supports the company's SmartShare technology, to throw music over to compatible LG TVs and Bluetooth speakers.
Battery life is just so-so. With the screen brightness turned all the way up, I got only 4 hours, 22 minutes of video streaming over LTE from the 4,800mAh battery. Turning down the screen, or using LTE less often would be the key to a full day's worth of use here.
Comparisons and Conclusions
The G Pad X 8.3 is the best tablet available for its price with a built-in Verizon LTE modem. That's a huge caveat, because most people will have a phone with hotspot mode, and I don't think you should go out of your way to get another one in your tablet.
If you're willing to use your phone as a hotspot, you have some better 8-inch available options in the $300 range. The Lenovo Yoga Tablet 2 AnyPen ( at Amazon) comes in at the same price and runs all Windows software. Lenovo's Android-powered Yoga Tablet 2 ( at Amazon) trades in that modem for a more elegant build and better battery life.
Our Editor's Choice tablets tend to be a little more expensive. The Nvidia Shield Tablet with AT&T LTE ($399.99 at ThinkGeek) is our pick for an LTE-powered Android tablet, at $399. I also like the Samsung Galaxy Tab S 8.4 ($629.99 at Samsung) , which also starts at $399 without LTE. And if you don't want to go the Android route, the Apple iPad mini 3 is an excellent choice. They're all worth the extra cost.
The LG G Pad X 8.3 is a good Android tablet value for the price, but some lag and a buggy touch screen make it frustrating to use at times.
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