Australian Review: LG G Pad 10.1

Design
The G Pad 10.1 is available in a choice of black and candy red (exclusive to Harvey Norman) that wouldn't look out of a place on a nice guitar, making it one of the few tablets to offer more than the standard black, white and silver colour options. While it doesn't break the mould, the G Pad 10.1 is one of the nicer looking Android tablets available.

Weighing just 523 grams, the G Pad 10.1 is a light tablet that's both easy and comfortable to hold, at least in landscape. The device feels a bit too elongated to use in portrait mode for reading a book, for example.

Unfortunately, the G Pad 10.1's screen doesn't share the same characteristics that made the G3's amazing. While it's a very bright display, the colour palate is a little muted and the resolution is a mere 1280×800 pixels. When stretched over a 10-inch display, the device's version of Android looks incredibly pixelated. LG have made a lot of circular icons in their UI customisations, which along with their choice of typography, highlight the low pixel density.

The resolution isn't as a noticeable when watching content, making the G Pad 10.1 a decent tablet for media consumption.

The G Pad 10.1 doesn't have any physical buttons on its front, the power button sits on top of the device instead. Users can however wake up the device using LG's Knock Code functionality where it's possible to enter a series of taps on the screen while it's off, simultaneously powering on the device and unlocking it.

The G Pad 10.1 uses a micro USB cable to charge, has both front and rear cameras and a headphone jack. The device is WiFi only.