Powerbars

[Ripper]

Is there much difference in say, a powerbar I buy for $50 at home depot.
Or...
The ones I can get at a music store?

[guitarmole]

Depends on the features. If you want just a power strip, they're basically all similar and consist of outlets wired in parallel with an on/off and maybe a circuit breaker reset.

If you want some surge protection, conditioning, filtering, etc, it varies depending on features and construction (MOVs, filters, chokes, etc). A good commercial unit or something advertised for computing use works as well as anything marketed for music in my opinion (even better I would think), but without the premium price. Brands like Monster and Furman will generally cost a lot more than a good non-specialty brand (or stuff marketed towards computing use) like Belkin or APS. Belkin and similar brands oriented towards computing and office supply also sell MANY more units due to the market and as a result, have much more R&D/feedback/revisions/improvements on their product than the music industry, which is a much smaller market by comparison.

However rackmount-type chassis aren't usually available from such brands so if you need a rackmount-style strip, you might have to stick with the music-marketed brands (but there are also cheaper brands among those)