LG G Pad's vanilla Android makeover (pictures)

Nearly identical to the original in hardware, the major difference with Google's LG G Pad 8.3 Play Edition is that it runs the unadorned stock version of Android 4.4 KitKat. It's available online at the Play Store for $349 -- a reasonable price for those dead set on a mid-sized tablet with vanilla Android.

The G Pad still has an 8.3-inch HD display with a 1,920x1,200 pixel resolution and 273ppi. It also has a 1.7GHz quad-core Snapdragon 600 processor and a 4,600mAh battery.

Though it makes the G Pad a bit more slippery, I like the device's smooth, faux-metal back panel. I also like how the tablet feels dense, without it being too heavy. Both characteristics give the G Pad a polished look.

On the device's top edge you'll find a 3.5mm headphone jack, and a microSD card slot that's expandable up to 64GB. The right houses a sleep/power button and volume rocker. At the bottom is a Micro-USB port for charging and transferring files.

The device sports a 1.3-megapixel front-facing camera and a 5-megapixel rear shooter. Since it doesn't have LG's built-in camera and photo editing software, you won't get features like pausing while recording, or activating the shutter with a voice command. However, you will get HDR shooting, and Photo Sphere.

Additional features include a Qualcomm Adreno 320 GPU, 16GB of internal storage, and Bluetooth 4.0 LE. During our tests for processor speeds, the Google variant scored a bit higher than its original LG counterpart.