I want to share some things I learned while setting up my strat, and I am still learning so bear with me.

One thing was when I bought the guitar, I thought the setup was aweful. I believe I may have been wrong.

First, I noticed that the saddles were not parallel with the bridge plate, instead they followed the radius of the neck. This means that one side of each saddle was higher than the other depending on if it was on the bass or treble side. The fender manual said the saddles should be parallel to the plate. It said nothing about following the neck radius, other than the overall height of the saddle should follow the radius to keep each string at the proper height. I adjusted all the saddles so they were parrallel to the plate but followed the radius to keep the strings at the same action height. This worked pretty good, but there was some fret out when bending. So I experimented and found that the original way it was set from the factory, while did not follow their own instructions, eliminated some fret out. This is obviously an experience issue for me, and I learned that I should not believe everything I read.

In guitars where the saddles are notched, this is probably not as important because any string slide on the saddle is eliminated. But strats have unnotched saddles that can allow the string to move its postion slightly on the saddle when bending. With the individual saddle itself following the radius, when you bend aggressively the string slides slightly to a higher level to match the neck radius and helps to eliminate fret out....pretty cool huh? Maybe the guys at fender do know a thing or two

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Guitars:
1. mid 70's Ventura MIJ Gibson l6-s clone (Pre-lawsuit) in Black with Rosewood FB and EMG 81 BR/ 85 Neck
2. ESP KH2 Neck Thru
3. 2008 Am Std Strat in 3 tone sunburst

First time i heard that the saddles should be parallel to the bridgeplate was here. I thought i'd give it a go and found i prefered my method of following the neck radius too. You do have to watch that both screws are contacting the plate ok though.

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No no and no

I am pretty certain that when if the manual said the saddles should be parallel to the bridge plate, it meant the saddles should line up with the sides of the bridge plate when looking down at the face of the guitar... in other words, make sure the saddles are not crooked.

Because the next statement about following neck radius would seem to contradict that.

Are you suggesting a college educated professional person could misinterpret basic english? Well, let me tell you that I think you hit the nail on the head . When I read parallel to the bridge, I thought that meant the height of the saddle should be equal on both sides of it, and the overall height of all the saddles should be adjusted to the neck radius. My saddles now make a smooth hill shape, they looked like steps going up and then down before

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Guitars:
1. mid 70's Ventura MIJ Gibson l6-s clone (Pre-lawsuit) in Black with Rosewood FB and EMG 81 BR/ 85 Neck
2. ESP KH2 Neck Thru
3. 2008 Am Std Strat in 3 tone sunburst

Very interesting posts here! Sorry, does fret-out have to do with the string touching another fret during bends? If I got it correctly, the guys from the factory really knew what they were doing! Fisrstrat's hill sounds better than the staircase thing Fender suggests, then.

Yes

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Guitars:
1. mid 70's Ventura MIJ Gibson l6-s clone (Pre-lawsuit) in Black with Rosewood FB and EMG 81 BR/ 85 Neck
2. ESP KH2 Neck Thru
3. 2008 Am Std Strat in 3 tone sunburst