Umm, that's cool, but I can assure you not that's clearly not he case on all units. I have pictures of the one I took to Atlanta using a Kill-A-Watt, and there were enough witnesses that were present, including members of this forum (Bargraphics, Phin Gage), and representatives from competing companies that saw this for their own eyes. Also there's plenty in this thread amongst the first recipients to verify otherwise.
And I'd be willing to bet a few satoshi's that the unit you took to Atlanta did not have the same firmware as those units that were subsequently shipped out to Day 1 customers onwards...and that the voltage was tweaked upwards in the interim thus increasing the power requirements (in the name of increasing performance/stability, I'm sure). Couple the fact that the actual physical design of the product was changed quite substantially (8 VRMs to 4 VRMs) and it's not exactly apples-to-apples
So basically all you can say is that a few machines that you know of pulled high watts, you don't know how many right?
I'd guess that, relative to the entire Day1/Day2/October production run its probably just a few isolated units caused by manufacturing and/or production tolerances.
I don't know for sure, thats why I am saying "I guess" but at least I'm not making out like it was a huge problem for everyone. Plus it was like Day 1 units, almost prototypes in a way, cutting-edge-get-it-before-anyone type stuff.
Surely the discussion is about now, people coming into the thread recently to find out what they need for the next batch.