Apparatus and methods advantageously maintain transistors of open-drain differential pairs biased in the saturation region when \u201cactive,\u201d rather in than the triode or linear region. The power storage systems is electrically connected to each other in parallel via the power supply bus. The origination network node is configured for transmitting a data packet to the destination network node through at least one router network node. Combinatorial logic connected to the shift register converts the four unique states into a two-bit binary signal representative of the four states.