Ever wish you had a tube amp with you everywhere for your headphones? Now you can with this switchable USB-C DAC

iBasso Nunchaku switchable USB-C amp (Image credit: iBasso)

The iBasso Nunchaku DAC lets you access two amp modes
It's USB-powered and houses Raytheon tubes
It's priced at $299 and comes with a built-in OLED display

What a day to be an obsessive audiophile. I’ve you ever gone to bed drifting off wishing you had an analogue-ready portable amp for some of the best wired headphones, your sweatiest sound dreams have come true. That’s because iBasso Audio has revealed a portable USB-C DAC (digital to analogue converter) with dual amp modes, including a tube amp option, and a fetching OLED display, to really stand out among the best portable DACs.

The Chinese audio specialist recently released the iBasso Nunchaku portable DAC (via Notebookcheck). Now brace yourself for the audiophile-baiting part. The compact little USB DAC has two selectable amps you can switch between and a pair of Cirrus Logic CS43198 DAC chips.

From early glimpses at this little digital amplifier, it screams quality. Not only is its premium-looking body made from aluminum, it also rocks the aforementioned OLED display, with the 0.96-inch screen designed to shield one of the Nunchaku USB’s duo of tempered glass sides.

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The iBasso Nunchaku DAC in red and silver finishes — (Image credit: iBasso)

Initially available in red or silver, this attractive portable amp has a comprehensive feature set. It supports both high-res PCM and DSD51 music stream, and if you really want to delve further into the sonic weeds, the promised signal-to-noise ratio is 130dB. Adjustable filters also allow you to tweak the sound profiles of whatever audio device you pair with the iBasso Nunchaku.

Switching over to its analog amp, the signal-to-noise ratio measures in at around 107dB, which should create enjoyable audio courtesy of the Nunchaku’s (wait for it…) dual Raytheon JAN6118 tubes, which are tested and paired specifically for each unit. iBasso makes clear there is a likelihood of a 'microphonic' effect from tapping or movement on the case transferring through the tube amps (there's a reason they're not commonly used on portable devices!), but these will be reduced as much as possible by its Poron polyurethane shock-mounted tubes.

You've got 4.4mm balanced output or 3.5mm headphones connections to make the most of everything here, so it should be a great bridge between laptops or phones and elite headphones.

Considering it has an OLED screen and has clearly been constructed with premium materials, it’s not surprising this palm-friendly amp is currently priced at $299 (about £240 / AU$475), which seems positively reasonable given the complexity and audio chops.

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Dave is a freelancer who's been writing about tech and video games since 2006, with bylines across GamesRadar+, Total Film, PC Gamer, and Edge. He's been obsessed with all manner of AV equipment ever since his parents first bought him a hideously garish 13-inch CRT TV (complete with built-in VCR, no less) back in 1998. Over the years he’s owned more plasma and OLED TVs than he can count. On an average day, he spends 30% of his waking existence having mild panic attacks about vertical banding and dead pixels.