Hey! I’m a dinosaur in that I mostly rock mechanical switches with best approximation for L-M-H. Still, having used various Acebeam products over the years, I welcomed their offer to send me one of the new UC3A for testing. It was fun to mess around with this one. I’m also glad to wish them a happy 12th Anniversary! (I’ll include some discount codes and a link to their event.)
I see that there are a couple of other reviews up already that go into deeper technical details so I’ll just cover the EDC value and lantern modes. That’s really what sets the UC3A apart. In addition to the main dual flashlight emitters, you get the strip along the side that provides diffuse light. It defaults to cool white but also provides red, green, and blue. You can see each of these lighting up some EDC gear in my pics below.
These are nice for activities where you’ll be setting the light down and it does have a magnetic tail that lets you stick it places. You get a choice of high and low for these and I find the low very usable. They can also be used as signaling devices and include relatively diverse blinking modes. The lantern starts in cool white and you have to double-press to cycle through alternating steady-colors and the blinking versions of those colors.
There is a downside to this setup. First, getting to the color or blinking color of choice involves a bunch of double-clicking. That’s not a big issue for me and I do understand the limitations of using two buttons to control three emission sources with four colors, 2-3 output levels, blinking and strobe. Still, it’s something to keep in mind. Second is that starting the lantern in cool white and having to get through cool white to get to red may undermine my favorite use of red at night: preserving night vision. Sure, it’s not the ideal “deep red” for that in the first place but I would have preferred a quick start to red.
I will commend the size and overall form factor. It feels good in hand and is very easy to carry for all that it can do. My only concern there is that the convenience of a magnetic tail also means having a magnet in your pocket. I know that’s not a thing for everyone but it is something to think about. It didn’t come with a belt attachment and that’s my preferred way to carry lights with magnetic tail caps.
I’ve been using it with the included lithium battery. While I have a bunch of chargers, I’m glad that the included battery accepts a USB-C. That’s really handy. I’m also glad that it can take NiMH or an alkaleak in a pinch. I just popped in an Eneloop Pro to check and sure enough, it works.
