LG G Pad 8.3 review: Couch surfer
Couch surfer
As an integral part of Android Jelly Bean, Google Now is present on the G Pad 8.3. You can get to it by swiping up from the home button.
In addition to being able to recognize voice commands, Google Now will learn from your usage patterns and display relevant information. For example, if you search for a particular sports team frequently, Google Now will display information for upcoming games you might want to watch.
The service interacts with you by generating cards which are displayed on your screen and give you a short overview of information it believes is relevant to you. Going to work in the morning? Google Now knows this and lets you know there's a big traffic jam on your usual way to the office, and will offer you an alternate route. This extends to a multitude of other areas, including weather, traffic, public transit stations, and nearby points of interest.
You can either type or talk to Google Now and the app will give you one of its aforementioned info cards (if available) and read you its contents aloud (you can disable this from the app settings). If there's no card to help with the answer to your question, Google Now will simply initiate a Google web search instead.
There is also a Google Now widget which generates information for you based on what your interests are.
Synthetic benchmarks
The LG G Pad 8.3 boasts a Snapdragon 600 chipset with four Krait 300 cores clocked at 1.7GHz, 2GB of RAM and the Adreno 320 GPU. This is identical to what powers the Optimus G Pro, so we expect numbers more or less in line with those of the 5.5-inch phablet, with most difference due to the fact that the G Pad has to some more pixels to push.
The G Pad 8.3 managed to join its G Pro brethren on top of the Benchmark Pi and Linpack tests, and was also able to beat out the Nexus 7 and Galaxy Note 8.0.
Benchmark Pi
Lower is better
-
LG G Pad 8.3
131 -
LG Optimus G Pro
147 -
Asus Nexus 7 (2013)
211 -
Samsung Galaxy Note 8.0
324 -
Samsung Galaxy Note 10.1
351 -
Samsung Galaxy Tab 7.0 Plus
470 -
Samsung Galaxy 3 7.0
483 -
Samsung Galaxy Tab 3 10.1 Plus
488 -
Samsung Galaxy Tab 2 7.0
499 -
Samsung Galaxy Tab 7.7
520 -
Huawei MediaPad
703
Linpack
Higher is better
-
LG Optimus G Pro
743 -
LG G Pad 8.3
736 -
Samsung Galaxy Note 8.0
324 -
Asus Nexus 7 (2013)
263 -
Samsung Galaxy Tab 3 10.1 Plus
222 -
Samsung Galaxy Note 10.1
185 -
Google Nexus 7
124 -
Samsung Galaxy Note
105 -
Samsung Galaxy Tab 7.7
86 -
Samsung Galaxy Tab 3 8.0
96 -
Samsung Galaxy 3 7.0
78
In our compound benchmarks, the G Pad did well once again, scoring towards the top of the charts in AnTuTu, Geekbench 3, and Quadrant. It handily outclassed its main rivals in the form of the Nexus 7 and Galaxy Note 8.0.
AnTuTu
Higher is better
-
Samsung Galaxy S4
24716 -
LG G Pad 8.3
24440 -
Samsung Galaxy Tab 3 10.1
24236 -
Sony Xperia ZL
20743 -
Sony Xperia Tablet Z
20216 -
LG Optimus G Pro
20056 -
HTC Butterfly
19513 -
Asus Nexus 7 (2013)
19131 -
Samsung Galaxy Note 8.0
17159 -
Oppo Find 5
15167 -
Google Nexus 10
12695 -
Samsung Galaxy Tab 3 8.0
9070
Geekbench 3
Higher is better
-
Samsung Galaxy Note 3
2937 -
LG G2
2243 -
HTC One
1972 -
LG G Pad 8.3
1950 -
HTC One Max
1899 -
LG Optimus G
1623 -
LG Nexus 4
1288 -
HTC Butterfly
1257
Quadrant
Higher is better
-
LG Optimus G Pro
12105 -
HTC One
11746 -
LG G Pad 8.3
11804 -
Sony Xperia Z
8075 -
LG Optimus G
7439 -
Sony Xperia Tablet Z
7215 -
Oppo Find 5
7111 -
Samsung Galaxy Note 8.0
6942 -
Samsung Galaxy Note II
5916 -
Samsung Galaxy Tab 3 10.1
5864 -
Asus Nexus 7 (2013)
5552 -
Samsung Galaxy Tab 3 8.0
4627 -
Nexus 4
4567 -
Google Nexus 10
4385
We ran GFXBench (formerly GLBenchmark) tests off-screen, which means we're testing at a fixed resolution and getting numbers for raw GPU power. The G Pad 8.3 didn't disappoint, and even outdoes the Optimus G Pro in the less-intensive Egypt test.
GLBenchmark 2.5 Egypt (1080p off-screen)
Higher is better
-
Apple iPad 4
54.4 -
Google Nexus 10
40 -
Samsung Galaxy S4
40 -
LG G Pad 8.3
39 -
Asus Nexus 7 (2013)
39 -
Sony Xperia Tablet Z
32 -
Asus Padfone 2
31 -
Oppo Find 5
30 -
LG Optimus G Pro
29 -
Sony Xperia ZL
29 -
Sony Xperia Z
29 -
LG Optimus G
29 -
HTC Butterfly
27.9 -
Apple iPhone 5
27 -
Samsung Galaxy Tab 3 10.1
26 -
Nexus 4
26 -
Samsung Galaxy Note II
17 -
Samsung Galaxy Tab 3 8.0
16 -
Samsung Galaxy S III
15 -
HTC One X+
12 -
HTC One X
9
GLBenchmark 2.7 T-Rex (1080p off-screen)
Higher is better
-
Samsung Galaxy S4
17.1 -
Apple iPad 4
16.8 -
Asus Nexus 7 (2013)
15 -
LG G Pad 8.3
15 -
Google Nexus 10
13.9 -
Sony Xperia Z
13.5 -
Sony Xperia Tablet Z
13 -
Sony Xperia ZL
12.8 -
Samsung Galaxy Tab 3 10.1
7.0 -
Samsung Galaxy Tab 3 8.0
4.0
But video benchmarks running at native resolution will give the most accurate portrayal of real world performance, which is why we've included the Unreal Engine 3-powered Epic Citadel benchmark. Unreal Engine is popular with mobile game makers, so it's a pretty important test. Here is where the G Pad 8.3 failed to top our charts this time around, but still posted a respectable score of 36.3 fps, which is quite playable.
Epic Citadel
Higher is better
-
Sony Xperia Z1
54.9 -
Sony Xperia Z Ultra
54.9 -
LG G2
51 -
Samsung Galaxy Note 3
47.7 -
Samsung Galaxy S4 (S600)
37.2 -
LG G Pad 8.3
36.3 -
HTC One
35.6 -
HTC One Max
34.9 -
HTC Butterfly
29.6
Our browser benchmarks show some great numbers from the G Pad 8.3, with the tablet scoring near the top of the category in the SunSpider web benchmark. With HTML 5 thrown into the mix in Browsermark and Vellamo, the G Pad does even better.
SunSpider
Lower is better
-
LG Optimus G Pro
1011 -
Asus Nexus 7 (2013)
1150 -
LG G Pad 8.3
1190 -
Samsung Galaxy Tab 3 10.1
1233 -
Samsung Galaxy Tab 3 8.0
1366 -
Google Nexus 7
1703 -
new Apple iPad
1722 -
Samsung Galaxy Note 10.1
1891 -
Samsung Galaxy Tab 7.7
1953 -
Samsung Galaxy Tab 7.0 Plus
1992 -
Galaxy Tab 2 7.0
2253 -
Huawei MediaPad
2490
BrowserMark 2
Higher is better
-
LG G Pad 8.3
2664 -
Asus Nexus 7 (2013)
2386 -
Samsung Galaxy Tab 3 8.0
2228 -
Samsung Galaxy Tab 3 10.1
2363 -
HTC One
2262 -
Sony Xperia Tablet Z
2170 -
LG Optimus G Pro
1801 -
Oppo Find 5
1797 -
Google Nexus 10
1773 -
Samsung Galaxy Tab 3 7.0
1612 -
HTC Butterfly
1475
Vellamo
Higher is better
-
LG G Pad 8.3
2505 -
Samsung Galaxy Note II
2418 -
HTC One
2382 -
Sony Xperia Tablet Z
2265 -
Samsung Galaxy S4
2060 -
Google Nexus 10
1929 -
HTC Butterfly
1866 -
Samsung Galaxy Tab 3 8.0
1633 -
Samsung Galaxy Tab 3 10.1
1777 -
Samsung Galaxy Tab 3 7.0
1440 -
Samsung Galaxy S III
1641 -
Asus Nexus 7 (2013)
1597
Overall, the Snapdragon 600 platform performs admirably on the LG G Pad 8.3. If you're planning on doing a lot of web surfing, the G Pad provided some excellent results, while the CPU also held firm in its own benchmarks. The real-time GPU performance is not stellar, but the results we achieved were still more than adequate.
Reader comments
- AnonD-142628
- 19 Dec 2013
- xpA
People complaing bout poor camera quality? well i don't care about the camera on a tablet. who takes pics with a tablet anyway....thats stupid.
- AnonD-142628
- 19 Dec 2013
- xpA
Great review. Sounds like serious competition for Nexus 7 2013. I was about to buy nexus 7, but i'll wait and try out LG G Pad first.I like the bigger screen..it's much wider. Only thing i don't like is LG UI. Nexus is 32 GB, LG only 16 GB, but LG is...
- vicky
- 16 Nov 2013
- 956
good