When you look at bow design, you have to remember that the arrow is not the center top to bottom. The actual midpoint of the bow is usually somewhere between the arrow and the throat of the grip. Some companies are on one side of that spectrum, some are on the other and there will be a big difference in how they feel because of that.
If the throat of the grip is the center, you about equal mass above and below your hand, which can result in a better balanced feel. I would guess that the drawback is that the arrow is farther from center and thus it takes more cam engineering to get a level nock travel.
If the arrow (berger hole) is the center, then you have about 1.5" more riser above your hand than you have below. To me this, makes the bow feel very top heavy and tipy. The advantage would be that he arrow path is the center and thus equal pull or rewind from each cam would result is a very good vertical nock travel.
The other factor is that with a parallel limb bow, risers have gotten longer to maintain axle to axle length and typically an inch of riser will weigh more than an inch of limb. That being said, this doesn't play too much of a role due to the axle to axle lengths getting shorter at well.
Don't write off ALL parallel limb bows, there are huge differences between all the companies and designs on the market.
I'm a pretty loyal HOYT shooter for a number of reasons, one of which being that I feel the bow is very well balanced in that top/bottom aspect, not to mention front to back as well. If you get a chance, try shooting a CRX or even one of the carbon bows, and I would guess that you would feel quite a balance difference from the Z7.
I'm not going to preach that one balance type is better, but most everyone has a preference that leans one way or the other.
Mitch
