[CMasten]

In the last few years I have purchased many of the wonderful portable amps, IEMS and full sized cans on the market. It’s nice to read reviews on products and then be able to purchase it yourself to see what you think. Some products satisfy and I find I don’t need to go any further, others I feel the need to buy, sell and then buy again until I find one that is "just right" for my needs and preference. My musical taste is essentially everything outside of classical, with an emphasis on rock, jazz and county

To date, I have found that the Senn HD600s to be my full sized headphones of choice along with Grado SR-80s that I have modified in several ways to be ‘just right”. Ety ER-4Ps and Shure E-500s have satisfied my IEM niche.

Headphone amps and interconnects seem to be the one area that I just have a hard time dialing in on. I have purchased about 10 amps now in total, with The RSA Hornet and the IBasso T2 being the last two. My criteria had been just driving a pair or IEMs but find that often when I travel and stay at a destination for a while I want my HD600s or SR80s with me, so most of the portable amps I have purchased have not been able to keep up with the higher impedance cans. The Hornet does an excellent job, is VERY well made and offers me the mid gain selection which I prefer with my Grados.

On these trips I always have my personal Laptop (HP DV9030) so I can set up my music in the hotel room, and I was curious how a DAC would make a difference. I have read Skylabs review on the Leckerton portable amp/DAC and was curious to try one. For less than $200 to my door I figured it was worth a shot and they offered a 30 day guarantee. I placed my order at the end of the week and to my surprise Nick at Leckerton sent me an email the next morning, letting me know it was going out on Saturday and that I should expect it on Tue. NICE! sure enough Tue rolls around there it is. Well packaged and ready to be broken in. I set up some pink noise and let it burn for the next week.

I was not expecting the build quality of Rays Hornet, that is a piece of art, but its also about 2x the cost of Leckerton and I was really curious how the DAC would sound over the Hornet on my Senn HD-600s. I was also curious to see how the layout worked for me. The one thing I didn’t like about the Headphonia amp was that the power and USB was on the front in the way with my input and output cables. The UHA-3 had those on the back, with ONLY the USB connector which handles power to recharge the battery NICE! I was also taken back by just how SMALL this thing is.. about the size of my Hornet and much smaller than everything else I have owned to date. Its housed in a quality metal case ( I don’t care for the cheap plastic ones) and its layout is just simple. I have input and output with the volume control on the front and on/off, gain and USB on the back. Not much else other than the simple Chg and Pwr indicators on the front. The gain switch is very nicely recessed in the back to either hi or low and the on/off switch is the best I have used to date, the cool illuminated one on my Hornet was always getting toggled off in my bag, the Leckerton requires more effort and its smooth and rounded so I have not had that issue with this amp. The Volume control on other amps was always a source of contention for me, they were either too large, too small, and had all kinds of strange non linear increments that I didn’t like. The Leckerton is super smooth, easy to turn, but not too easy and by far the most linear of any amp I have owned so it’s really easy to guess about where it needs to be to get the volume I am looking for.

You have already heard others comment on the Leckertons excellent sound as both a portable amp but the DAC is just superb, super quiet, on low gain, it has that nice black noise floor I like in my Hornet. In High gain the noise is more apparent but not bad, and I can easily drive my HD600s from low gain so it’s a non issue for me. I have been working this little amp over with the latest Evanescence “The Open Door” and “Fallen” as source material since it covers a lot of dynamic range and I can say after a couple of days, I have finally found a portable amp that I can use for both my IEMs and my full sized cans that is “just right” .

Nick over at Leckerton has been very communicative as to what I like, what I don’t like and very open to suggestions for his next series, seems like a quality guy with a good eye for detail and sound quality, but also understanding that I don’t want to spend $500 on my portable DAC. For less than $200 to your door, I would say this little amp is a great bargain, but unlike the other amps you may have heard this one might be “just right” for you too so you can focus on spending your money on some other piece of new equipment J

The UHA-3 is very nicely made, I expect to keep this one for a while and feel it will have a long productive life. Nice touch on the easy to replace battery too Nick


I have not seen other photos that really showed off just how small this thing is. I have average sized hands but its easily on par with my Hornet.