Perfect Path Tecnologies ‘The Gate’


Having been a music lover and audio enthusiast for more decades than I care to admit to I’ve had the privilege of owning some tremendous components over those years and thought I had attained a level of musical enjoyment that would be difficult to improve upon without spending more money than I could afford. Then along came The Gate to turn my audio conceptions on end. 

While I was quite skeptical of all of the positive proclamations regarding the Perfect Path mats, cards and contact enhancer ( how could they possibly bring about such sonic improvements?) I took the plunge and purchased a nano bundle to see what the hubbub was all about. Much to my surprise they not only brought about improvements to my systems’ ability to recreate a more musical sound but did so in spades. 

When Tim of Perfect Path Technologies asked if I wanted to try his new product, The Gate, I jumped at the chance thinking it would be a nice addition to what the other products provided. I wasn’t prepared for the quantum leap The Gate brought to my music listening pleasure. As much as the other products brought about a much lower noise floor, greater detail and delicacy, improved dynamics, richer tone and more realism The Gate does so in magnitudes difficult to describe. The best way I can describe its affect is unreal purity leading the most realistic musical sound I’ve had the pleasure of experiencing.....outside of a live performance obviously. It has me listening to all of my CD’s as if for the first time again.

I have no idea how The Gate actually works or what it does I just know it’s the most dramatic tweak to my system I’ve ever experienced and I wouldn’t think of being without it. As to how it’s implemented, it’s installed in the electrical panel with one lead connected to the common buss and the other to a breaker ( preferably 220). Hope I got the terminology correct.....I’m far from being an electrician!

At $4,999.00 it’s not cheap but worth every penny to me as I’ve spent more on components with less sonic improvement. 

Lastly, I realize some will scoff at something they can’t understand and I get not understanding it as I don’t, but I would hope people could keep their skepticism healthy and civil. I am not here to promote or sell, nor do I have any affiliation with PPT. I am only sharing something that I’ve found to be transforming in my system. Sorry for the lengthy introduction.
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Showing 16 responses by millercarbon

Hang around here long enough and there's a good chance that you will learn the difference between "attacking" and "reacting."

Said the guy with 108 posts. Who has been here like, well ha, what a joke, dude just got here. During which he has done nothing but stir the pot. Pathetic.


atdavid: Narrator ... and here I thought you were an engineer?


Nope. Wrong. He claims to be a theoretical physicist, developer of interstellar space craft and quantum drive, protege or pal of the late Nobel laureate Richard Feynman. But all we know for sure is he has a website where he sells flying saucers and teleportation tweaks based on morphic fields. http://machinadynamica.com

Seriously. Not making this up. Click the link. Flying saucers. Teleportation tweaks.

A quick web search will turn up a guy who claims to have met him at a show one time and that he is really only putting on a big show of being a nut job in order to poke fun at super-serious audiophiles.

DYODD, make up your own mind. All I can say is, if its an act he makes Andy Kaufman look like an amateur.
Thanks for the link. My favorite bit:
the now sold-out SR25 (we still have some units in stock)

Sorry they are all sold out. But in case you missed it we still have some in stock! lol!
Okay so that is the hardest thing to swallow so far, that it works so good you can no longer hear any difference between day and night. That's not even something a lot of people are even aware of or have ever noticed.

Okay so here's another one- the breaker test. Listen to your system. Flip off breakers to the rest of the house. Listen again. Sound the same? Different? Better?
Its only 40 days since the first post back when this was so new it wasn't even on their website yet. A few who added them later, might not even have had them a month yet. The Gate by its very nature is always "on" so we can count everything from installation as burn-in time. We know its fantastic but what's the big picture 30+ days in?

By now it has probably transitioned from being mind-blowingly better every time you turn around to mind-blowingly better each day to every once in a while damn how is it still getting better to, well you get the idea?

And now that you're used to it, do you still notice the usual "it still sounds better late at night" kind of thing or is that now just a thing for us poor unenlightened schlubs now?
vinylshadow-
What is The Gate exactly? A noise filter?
No, it is not a filter. What it is "exactly" is very hard to say. What I can say for sure is it is not a filter. In the normal sense of the word, a filter is a screen of some kind that allows to pass more of what you want and less of what you don’t want. If that sounds obvious well, you’re the one who wants to know exactly what it is. Sometimes all we can do is tell you exactly what it is not. It is not a filter. Nothing goes through it.

It does however seem to behave as if it were a filter. It sure sounds like the power is hugely cleaner. If you have ever listened late at night and loved the sound, well this is like that only about a hundred times better.

Everyone wants to know exactly what is going on. No matter how many times or how clearly it is stated we don’t know- and wouldn’t tell you if we did! Only thing more frustrating than that is when I DO tell people as best I can what I THINK is going on, nobody cares. So I am about THIS CLOSE to telling you all to STUFF IT!

ONE LAST TIME!

The signal is not what we think it is. The signal is not electrons traveling down wires like water in a pipe. Yes this does happen to some degree but nowhere near enough to account for what we hear. The vast majority of the signal is the fluctuating electromagnetic field created by and surrounding these same electrons.

Because the signal is a field emanating from and around electrons in a conductor, and not merely within the conductor itself (or along its "skin", or any of that malarkey), then all kinds of things placed within this field are going to affect the signal. Study physics, the field radiates out to infinity. I seriously hope you are paying attention, bookmarking, studying, because seriously getting tired having to explain this. Okay not explaining, actually like that part. It’s the nobody getting it part that’s getting old. See my post from April last year. One full year explaining I think is quite enough, and we are just about there.

Now, we all know about all kinds of cool new materials that have fascinating properties like superconducting at room temp. Most of the attention is focused on computing and things where micro-precision is required and so a lot of this research is still in the lab. But the same principle can be used in a gross general application like improving signal transmission in wires. Hello? Beuller! Right.

So you take some of these incredible materials, put them near a wire, the fields interact, and the transmission integrity of whatever is in the wire improves dramatically.

This is exactly how this stuff works. Near as I can tell anyway. This is why it works in an electrical panel. And I am not gonna tell you more except to brag and say I figured a lot of this out all on my own right from the beginning even before getting one and using it. Simply knowing it goes in the panel ought to be enough for you to figure out what is going on. It was for me. Sorry if you’re not up to it. I am. Deal with it.

All this stuff is more or less the same too. This is why Total Contact works even when painted on the outside of caps and transformers and wires. It is much more than a nano-arc reducing contact enhancer. Read this post over and over again until it sinks in!

This is how eMats and eCards work. This is why the empty suit moron is such an unspeakable moron he can’t understand its nothing to do with shape or manufacture or magnets or any of that. The freaking label- ITS NOT THE LABEL!!! And yes some of it we call "filters". This is totally to do with the inability of people to get their mind around what I’m saying. You ask, we explain, yet still you do not understand. So we like space aliens try to put it in terms your limited intelligence can comprehend. Like go watch Star Trek until you figure it out! https://youtu.be/9463hBWy0ig?t=20

This is why Mats work on the outside of speakers. Get it? This is why they work under and over and near all kinds of components. Get it? This is why it works even in a panel way out in the garage. The signal isn’t in the wire, and it is not just in your house or your system either. The signal is a fluctuating field that goes out in all directions and it extends - you can look this up in the physics books - to infinity. And beyond, as Buzz Lightyear would say.

Get it? Got it? No? Too bad. Done anyway.

Almost. One more thing. Just get one. Get a Gate from Tom, if you can. Or whatever else you can. Just do it. Read what Frank says. Read what I say. We are not kidding. Just do it.
What long term results? The Gate is so freaking good how anyone ever manages to disconnect it is beyond me. You went a couple DAYS? I couldn't go a couple MINUTES! 

In my system The Gate is really just the beginning. There's Mats all over the place starting with one on the METER, a few in the panel, strips cut and zip tied along the AC wire, around my step down transformer, inside the conditioner, and speakers, with pieces cut into tubes wrapped around all the wires- speaker cables, interconnects, power cords. 

The amp has Omega e-Cards between and around all the transformers. Total Contact, that stuff is pasted everywhere. Took my electrical panel apart. By apart I mean down to the bare copper bus bars. Pasted those, the neutral bus bar, ground bus bar, and the AC power line its entire length under the house. Coated all the transformers- step down, Active Shielding, conditioner. Pasted caps, inductors, tubes, pretty much everything that can be done without causing a short, inside pretty much everything there is. Tone arm, cartridge, phono leads, the works.  

Long term effects? All this stuff (and more, but Fight Club rules) sounds absolutely fabulous right away, then somehow after a month or so you notice it just got even better. After a couple months though, sad to say, no more unless you buy more. 

Worth it? The last group of audiophiles to drive up from Portland one of them had me play Steely Dan, which I guess must be one of his "reference" things he likes to judge systems with, and afterwards said, "That's the best ever heard that." 

Since then, done even more. Those guys would be shocked to hear how much better it is now! So there's your long term results- sorry if I didn't stand still frozen in place after putting The Gate in but when you got something this good you just want more. And more. And more!
jetter
For a $5K unit some persons would want a bit of an explanation of what’s going on to make it work. Mildly surprised Tim hasn't.

Yeah, wouldn't it be nice to know? Right down to the parts list, cheapest/best places to buy them- oh, and assembly instructions. Mildly surprised Tim hasn't posted all that. More I think about it, kinda selfish, keeping it all to himself. After doing all that work. Himself. To not just give it away.

Or do you mean, mildly surprised Tim hasn't made up some mumbo jumbo marketing malarkey? Audiophiles absolutely LOVE marketing malarkey! Slurp it up like Mother's milk!

Two problems: one, it takes real talent to do that and come off like Ted Denney III and not the Machina Dynamica guy. And two, well never mind the first one should be more than enough to make the point. You'll just have to trust me when I say, when you understand enough of this deeply enough after a while they pretty much all start to sound like the Machina Dynamica guy.

Besides, even if he did explain it, what difference would it make? Ted Denney says right up front that a lot of his products (PHT, ECT, HFT, FEQ, etc) work on the principle of dither. So what? So dither for starters seems a difficult concept to understand. Even if you do, what difference would that make?

None of this would matter in the least except for the fact people actually avoid taking steps that would dramatically improve their systems simply because they can't get past the mental stumbling block of having to understand why. How do I know? Because I for years did exactly that. Now I know better.

You too can stop stumbling around. Simply change your mind. Easiest thing in the world.

 


jetter, not big on reading before writing I see. Because if you had you’d know the apology I’m still waiting on is folkfreak apologizing to Frank for saying this is all "obviously over your (Frank's) head."

So now it seems you owe me an apology. But guess what? Not holding my breath!
uberwaltz
Best approach would be just do it yourself paying due diligence to your own health and safety.

As I obviously would do this in a heartbeat I am not at all concerned but can concede the point.


Bingo! What a difference, between the armchair quarterbacks and the real deal. Thanks!

Would not be the first time I had been presented with a piece of equipment on site with zero paperwork or electrical prints and been asked to "just wire it in"

Uh uh, no way Jose!

However we are talking 480v and 1200a plus applications, something that will pick you up and throw the leftovers across the room if you screw up!


Just to clarify, talking about two very different things here- the residential voltage Gate you would install in a heartbeat, and the high voltage/current applications you would not on your life do without thoroughly understanding exactly what you're dealing with. Well, of course. Makes total sense.

Would be nice if more people knew enough to make such distinctions. Or if not then would just keep their comments to themselves. Hard enough finding really good gear without all the distraction.


Well then its even worse than I thought. Because a genuine EE ought to know enough to be throwing water on this with knowledge and not fanning the flames with innuendo.

Another teachable moment: saying you're an EE is not even remotely the same as demonstrating actual knowedge. Saying you're an EE only matters to people who think titles matter. Which sure ain't me. Which is why I asked for actual hands on experience, and a demonstration of electrical principles. Neither of which you've provided.

Oh and, still waiting on that apology.
The teachable moment in all this otherwise pointless scaremongering is, notice how all the alarmists have absolutely zero tangible direct knowledge of what they are nevertheless so eager to advise others all about. For certain they know absolutely nothing about what is inside the Gate. More than likely they know next to absolutely nothing about electricity, beyond probably getting a shock one time. And that was it for them! Electricity scary! Electricity bad!

Tell me I’m wrong. Next scaremongering commenter, tell us all how many panels you’ve installed, components you’ve built or modified, and then instead of parroting regulations let’s hear you explain the risks in a way that demonstrates some understanding of electrical principles. At all. Because I sure haven’t seen any signs of it yet. And I actually have done all that stuff.

And oh folkfreak, "obviously over your head"? Frank went to an awful lot of effort checking and you may not like what he found but that’s no cause for insult. I think you owe Frank an apology.
So what happened? Did we test the sound with the breakers off before installing The Gate?
Ad says its sized to fit inside those panels. Not that its sized to handle those loads.

In fact it doesn't seem to handle any load at all. I thought maybe someone was mistaken but sure enough this is what the ad says:
One lead connects to an existing breaker, the other to neutral bar. That's it!
Connected that way, if you know anything about electrical panels, the breakers are hot and the neutral is the utility ground that completes the circuit, in other words if it was a wire it'd be a short. Now since nobody has said anything about these things glowing red hot before bursting into flames I'm gonna go out on a limb and say its not a wire.

But also, the size or number of circuits or even the panel can't matter because it doesn't have any current flowing through it. What it almost certainly does have however is something that shunts any and all noise riding on the AC line to ground. 

Its interesting its wired to neutral and not ground. Three wires come into residential panels- two hot and one neutral. In addition to this we are required to add an earth ground. I notice they do not say to wire to earth ground. Also notice they do not require connecting to both incoming legs. Well, all circuits from either leg are completed by connecting to neutral. So if the goal is line noise then connecting one leg to neutral in effect connects everything in the house. This is why flipping breakers off improves sound even when its circuits with nothing connected or running. The wires themselves even with nothing running are antennae feeding RFI into the system.

All the review comments so far sound to me exactly like what I get when I go flip off all the breakers. Noise floor drops dramatically, grain and glare disappear, everything just sounds incredibly real. 

So Frank you're gonna put one in tomorrow. Got to flip the breakers off anyway. Only take a few minutes to flip them all off except the system, see how it sounds. To compare no breakers before to breakers Gate after. Be very interested to hear what you hear. Very interested.