FrankG: The Hydra 4 & 6 use "silver buss straps" while the Hydra 8 uses "copper buss bars". Evidently, the buss bars are heavier gauge than straps, so they went to using the cheaper conductor ( copper instead of silver ) due to the greater amount of material needed.
Having said that, the outlets are all still wired in a daisy chain fashion. AS such, they rely on the power distribution of
one set of wires to the first outlet to feed ALL of the remaining outlets in the Hydra.
This was a poor circuit design in my opinion as the last outlet has the longest path and will only recieve the amount of voltage and current that isn't soaked up by the other outlets prior to it. This means increased ripple and voltage fluctuations for all the devices tied to a Hydra.
Had they wired everything to one central junction point, all the path lengths would remain consistent and independent of each other. The only potential for sag or ripple would be left up to how much current that central junction point could pass and what the power cord from the wall outlet could provide.
Since the outlets are all wired in a parallel-series daisy chain fashion in the Hydra, it increases the potential for circuit crosstalk and inter-circuit contamination. That's because there's nothing stopping internally generated noise from within a component from feeding back into the other outlets that it is directly tied to via the buss bars. After all, it's not like there is any type of isolation or filtering device between each outlet and the buss bars themselves.
If they were smart and went with the central junction point approach, they should have also included another parallel line filter at that point. This would have filtered everything prior to distribution into each outlet. With the incoming AC cleaned up, the parallel line filters at each outlet have less work to do. They would only have to soak up the internally generated noise within the component itself and the remainder of RFI that got past the first filter at the main junction.
Even if internally generated noise were to sneak past the individual parallel line filter at each outlet and make it back into the distribution node, it would run into the master parallel line filter before it could pass into any of the other outlets. This approach would catch RFI / internally generated noise coming and going from the distribution node and at each outlet. There is NO chance for cross contamination using this approach, unlike the current design.
Like i said, it is a fancy power strip using higher grade parts, parallel line filtration and high energy MOV's. As usual, it is a lot of money for an under-designed "audiophile grade" product that relies on cosmetics and marketing hype. I'm NOT saying that such a design can't or doesn't provide benefits as compared to other similarly designed products, only that there is more potential to be had from a product that offers a more thorough design and build. Sean
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PS... If i, an off the street knucklehead that has the reputation of being a "know-it-all internet shit talker", can figure this stuff out, what's going on with all of these high priced engineers with those fancy degrees??? How come they can't figure this kind of stuff out???
PPS... I wonder how many toes i stepped on by telling the truth about this one??? I can already see the raging private emails, negative public responses and hear the voices grumbling amongst themselves.
PPSS... I wonder how many ideas / design concepts for various products that i've given away for free over the years via public discussions on the net??? I'm beginning to think that i could have been a very rich man. That is, if i was both more motivated and greedy : )
