Hasta La Gadget!

Just when you thought the race for iPad market share was full up, LG tosses its hat in the ring.The South Korean handset manufacturer opted to wait until the 90-some tablet scrum that was CES was over before showing the world the Optimus Pad (it was announced as the G Slate at that event, but apparently wasn’t ready to actually debut), an 8.9 inch slate that splits the difference (at least in terms of screen size) between the Apple and Samsung’s devices–the iPad is too big and the Galaxy is just a bit too small, insists the company.

The tablet has two rear-facing 5MP cameras that let the user capture 3D video. The device can also connect to HDTVs via HDMI, to play back all of that 3D video you’ve just captured.You can also watch 3D on the device with a pair of glasses. The thing can record at 720p in 3D and a full 1080p in 2D.

The Optimus Pad has a NVIDIA Tegra 2 chip inside and runs Android 3.0 Honeycomb.