These are not the same size of amplifier: Yamaha A-S801 has roughly 2.2x the power of LEAK Stereo 130. That is about 3.5dB, so it is a question of room size and how hard your speakers are to drive, not of one being the better amplifier.
| Area | Better | Why |
|---|
| Power | A | Yamaha A-S801 has more power - 100W against 45W into 8 ohms. That is about 3.5dB, so it plays usefully louder before it runs out and has more in hand on peaks. |
| Room size | depends | We rate Yamaha A-S801 the better fit for a mid-size room, a large room and a very large room, and LEAK Stereo 130 for desk or near-field listening and a small room. Match the amplifier to the room you actually have, not the one you want. |
| Noise floor | B | LEAK Stereo 130 is the quieter design on paper - 108dB against 99dB. Audible mainly with sensitive speakers in a quiet room. |
| Built-in DAC | evenly matched | Both have a DAC on board with much the same capability. |
| Analogue inputs | A | Yamaha A-S801 takes more analogue sources - 6 against 2. |
| Room to grow | evenly matched | The same expansion options on both. |
| Shelf space | depends | LEAK Stereo 130 takes up about 38% less shelf area (1115cm² against 1792cm²), and it is 73mm shallower, which is the measurement that decides whether a rack door shuts. |
| Price | A | Yamaha A-S801 costs less - $900 against $995 at list. |
| Watts per dollar | A | Yamaha A-S801 is the cheaper watt - about $9 per watt against $22. A blunt measure, and it says nothing about how either sounds, but it is the honest one for raw output. |
A Yamaha A-S801 B LEAK Stereo 130
depends neither is better in the abstract - it turns on your room, your system or how you will use them. Only specs published for both amplifiers are judged; anything missing on either side is left out rather than guessed.
Which should you choose?
Yamaha A-S801 has the edge on paper, though not by much. The rows marked "depends" are more likely to decide this than the score is. Start with the room. In a large or open-plan room, or with speakers that are hard to drive - low sensitivity, or an impedance that dips - Yamaha A-S801 has the headroom, and headroom is what stops an amplifier hardening up on peaks. At desk distance or in a small room, 45 watts is already more than most people ever use, and the extra 55 watts would be headroom you pay for and never hear - we rate Yamaha A-S801 poorly for near-field use for exactly that reason.
What a spec sheet cannot show: how either sounds with your speakers, how the controls feel day to day, and what the app is like to live with - which is where most all-in-one amplifiers are actually won or lost. Power figures are the manufacturers' own and are not measured to a common standard, so treat small differences as noise. If you can hear both, that will tell you more than any row above.