About Patrick

Hi, I'm Patrick Clarke. I research home tech so you don't have to lose an evening to it.

I'm an electrical engineer with over 30 years in the field. That background is why I read the specs, run the numbers, and check the energy maths — not because I claim to have tested every product in a lab.

Let me be upfront about what this site is, because a lot of sites in this corner of the internet are not. MyGadgetDad publishes research-based buying guides. I do not run a test lab. I have not personally bought and lived with every product I write about, and I'm not going to tell you I have.

What I actually do is the boring bit that most people skip:

• Read the manufacturer specifications properly — power draw, standards support, whether it needs a hub, whether the app is subscription-locked.
• Read across large volumes of verified owner reviews, looking for the failure patterns that only show up after six months of ownership.
• Pull in independent testing from publications that do run labs, and say where the figures came from.
• Check what's genuinely popular with UK buyers, and track price history so a "discount" is measured against the real usual price.
• Do the maths on running costs and payback at current UK energy prices, in pounds, for a UK home.

That's an honest description of the work. Where I do have first-hand experience with a product — and there are some, because I have a drawer that says so — I'll say it plainly in that article rather than implying it everywhere.

I'd rather have a smaller site that you can trust than a bigger one that quietly overstates itself. If you ever spot a claim here that doesn't hold up, tell me and I'll correct it.

I do the research. You get the shortlist. Your drawer stays empty.

— Patrick