Could the line conditioner have been robbing dynamics even if no components were pluged into it?
Seems extremely unlikely to me. Your
AudioPrism Power Foundation Conditioner appears to simply provide a bunch of outlets and some passive noise filtering.
With nothing plugged into it, unless it is defective it should be drawing negligible current, and have no effect on line voltage. If it were defective and drawing enough current to affect line voltage, it would be getting hot and/or its breaker would trip.
Assuming that it was turned on when you made these observations, I suppose it is remotely conceivable that it could have some effect on noise conditions on the line, that might affect noise entering components plugged in elsewhere. I suppose it is also remotely conceivable that if it is located close to susceptible cables or components it might affect them to some small degree by radiating EMI or RFI to them. And if either of those effects were occurring, I suppose it would then be remotely conceivable that the sensitivity of your audio components to those effects might change during warmup.
How remote is "remotely conceivable", IMO? If I were a betting man I would be happy to offer 1000:1 against those possibilities.
Regards,
-- Al