Of course there has to be some performance. Back when I actually had money I bought myself a "nice" Magnaflow exhaust..that wasn't all there. They literally took a piece out of the kit and figured it would work. lol This was over a month or two ago. Just today I received confirmation that they have sent me the piece of pipe I am missing. I've been running just a down-pipe and about 24-32" of pipe. The sound is starting to get a little annoying but I like it.
I also yanked that lame-o silencer ring off of that little 'ol HX35doubleya'.