Anybody see this demo from CES?
http://news.cnet.com/news/0-4204072.html?tag=mvid#

Looks like it will rip CDs for you. They say it will have a 6 GB drive and cost $1500. I can't remember if they even announced a projected date for it. Probably 2003 or 2004 ;-) I think Pioneer may have also demonstrated a hard-drive based in-car unit but I'm not sure.

I could care less since I have my 30 GB Empeg player being delivered today or tomorrow probably ($400 from SonicBlue--yes they still have units left--I can't understand why someone would pay $450 for a 10 GB on ebay?!?!). I can't wait for mine to get here.

Sony is integrating a bunch of that memory stick junk into their players anyway. Who needs that?

I doubt anyone will ever make a good one again
I can't see anyone else making a pull out and I can't think of another good way to get the music on it. like I wanna sit in my car and rip 250 cd's and if I have to do it in the car what about the track info

or the other bad way to do it I have read about is using a memory card like this unit will probably have a memory stick so then what I sitck a couple cd's on there and go to the car load those then repeat 125 times.

plus if I am going to pay 1500 for a car stereo I like the security of being able to take it out of the car

Some more info on the Sony and Pioneer models:

Sony:
- I didn't hear the size of HDD; 6GB or 10GB sounds plausible.
- Power load tray, up to 8x ripping; not slot load
- Usual AM/FM/4x45w amp stuff. Built in fan.
- Has a VFD about the same size as the empeg's one, but monochrome only (not even greyscales) so looks fairly poor. Visuals pretty poor, mainly because of screen and low framerates.
- Two rotary controls, one for volume/sound and the other for finding music.
- Doesn't appear to have a search function, you can just scroll through artist names/album names.
- Didn't appear to have any track naming capability, but I could be wrong here.
- No CDDB, so it will read CD-TEXT or you input the titles character by character
- Can copy MP3 files from CD-ROMs. Not sure how this content would be managed, as they only had 2 audio CDs loaded onto the unit for demo.
- Had a "most acsessed" and "least acsessed" (yes, spelt like that - must be beta!) mode, anong with a timestamp mode to find CDs, which looked fairly promising (eg, play me the CD I most recently ripped).
- Will download content to memory stick for listening to out of the car
- Has firewire port (4 pin) behind front panel for a future backup HDD, allowing user to back up their collection to a blessed HDD.
- Out sometime in 2002 for $1500 list.

Pioneer:
- 10GB hdd
- Slot load tray. 1x (real time) ripping.
- Compresses to ATRAC internally.
- Usual AM/FM/4x45w stuff. Built in fan. XM & DAB radio control support.
- Gorgeous OEL display, as with other high-end pioneers.
- Lots of flashy animations, but no music-linked visuals that I could see apart from scope/fft.
- Gracenote CDDB, so knows track titles. Can be updated using memory stick slot.
- No rotary control, music management *VERY* slow (could be a beta though) - eg, about 3 seconds disc to disc, listing 6 disc titles on screen takes ~4 seconds. Painful to navigate!
- No search. Access modes "analog" (lists recordings from XM/DAB tuner - won't record from AM/FM strangely!), "digital" (lists rips) and "all" (lists everything). Can list by artist or album name.
- Some sort of playlist building, but I couldn't figure out how to use it.
- Will play MP3 cds, but will not copy files to HDD - "copyright issues" cited.
- Out in next quarter for $2000 list.

I've got some video of both units in operation, when I get back I'll try and work out how to use my firewire card and put them online somewhere!

All in all, very underwhelming - especially if you're used to an empeg!

Hugo

Boy, oh, Boy. That *is* pretty underwhelming, especially at those MSRPs! Am I reading this right? The only way to move music onto these players is via in-car ripping from CD?

Sony seems bent on using half-baked Firewire for control functions only, not for data. My own imaginary "perfect" next-gen player would be Empeg software/function and visuals mated to a non-pull-out, Pioneerish-looking fascia connected to a Ph**Box-ish (but Firewire, with low profile, 2.5" drives and Empeg shock mounting) cartridge in the trunk. Neither of these units come withinn 10 miles of that.

Side note: Since these folks are showing units, they'd seem to be crossed off the potential Empeg OEM suspects list. Likewise , Kenwood with the Phatbox OEM deal. I ask myself who that leaves. Anybody want to knock some of these off my list (or add)?:

-Panasonic
-Alpine
-Clarion
-Blaupunkt
-JVC

Hugo, thanks for all that info.

JUNK !

was the sony unit a single din ?

that has to be packed to have tray loading and a hdd

and people said empeg was a high price for its features!

Ripping isn't the only way... You can rip, burn to CD-R and then transfer.

I'll stick with my empeg.

i'll add to that list of possible OEM folk

merc, BMW, ford, GM

can you imagine a re hashed HSX in a car.

Instead of Ford, I think it may be Visteon (who used to be owned by Ford until a few years ago and was spun off.) Ford is still their main "Client" but they are now more free to do work for other auto companies. This company has some cool ideas like dashes that are basically computer screens and will allow "skins". Want your dash to look like a P-51 Mustang or a Spitfire? How about like a Jetson's car or an old Jag? Just change the user preference and away you go!

GM's equivilant is Delphi which was also recently spun off.

My imaginery net gen empeg/oem would be the following

Take one empeg add a dash of ipod, a sprinkling of face off unit stir in a little phat box and finally a large dash of DAB

bake slowly and garnish with the ever so good empeg software

What you would end up with is an empeg with a face off front but here is the lovely trick up it's sleeve. In the face off is a small hard drive in it containing the playlist database and also having some space on it for transferring files. this would then pop into a small cradle connected to your pc so you could transfer files to your player. Now the ipod bit come in here also in the face off is a battery charged off your player unit which powers a small mp3 player built into the face plate. You choose what songs you want to sit on it or your favorite tracks can automatically be dropped onto it from the main hard drive in the car unit which would be about 60gig

Now i might even swap my empeg for that but i will say the current set up with a pull out is about the best solution for me and the way i use the empeg.

Hi.

Sounds pretty much like what we would call "Eierlegende Wollmilchsau" in German, or to describe its meaning: A thing that does simply everything that _might_ be wanted by someone.

I don't think anything like that will happen. Well, if you drop the face-off part that is also a standalone MP3 player, and replace it just with a face-off part that is nothing but a key and UI to the unit, it sounds a lot more likely. The idea of having an external harddisc, and a (smaller) drop-in harddisc is somehow intriguing (sp?) to me, but it implies a lot of difficulties on the developers part, like how to do deletions, how to make sure the database is correct after sync etc. But still, a possible solution.

What I would love as an empeg followup (MkIII or whatever you would like to call it) is about this:
Take the MkII, add Bluetooth and/or 802.11 support (802.11b si enough, but I would _love_ 802.11a), add VR and an interface to use it as a GSM/UMTS phone, or at least as a good handsfree solution for existing mobile phones (you know, one with echo compensation, handsfree dialing etc.). Now add an interface that allows for an additional drive bay which might either contain a CD drive (if not built into the main unit) or additional (3,5"?) harddiscs. Also, add at least two usable serial ports for 3rd party apps (like for OBD-II monitoring as well as GPS). I don't care too much for USB if 802.11 or bluetooth are available, but a USB (preferably 2.0) master port instead of the second serial would be extremely nice, because it adds virtually unlimited expandability to the unit (like Ethernet, harddics, additional serial ports etc.).
My ideal unit would look like this:

1. Base about the same as MkIIa, but with 32MB of RAM
   
2. Add USB 2.0 master or at least dual USB 1.1 master
   
3. Add DAB capable Tuner (internally if possible), keep AM/FM tuner available.
   
4. If possible add internal CD-ROM drive for checking freshly bought CDs, listening to a friends CDs or stuff like that, or even for map CDs for the navigation add-on

Wouldn't care if Ethernet would be stripped out (can be added with external USB adapter). Also, additional serial ports can be added in the same way, if necessary via a USB hub. I don't ask for much, do I?
Oh, for me, a quick-out is prefered over the face-off kind, I also like the optical understatement of the empeg and its superb menu structure (though it is getting a bit too big in the top level now).

cu,
sven

I say something that stores in the trunk or glove box (doesn't have to be tiny) can be hooked to a cd changer if one would ever want to (may on the way home from the cd store or if a passanger just HAS to hear something you don't have ripped yet). This would be hooked up to a dash mounted big color LCD or plasma touch-screen. It would integrate with after market radar detectors, GPS/Nav and the car itself (the screen would display fuel remaining and other car info.).

Or, if the hard drive had to be stored in the dash, it would connect tothe amp via optical or ethernet connections. Have you guys seen the new "live concert IP networking" stuff out? Guitars, microphones, keyboards, etc, now have ethernet jacks on them. Hook that up to a compatible mixer and the second you plug it in, it knows what the wire is hooked to because of the unique ID and can load a pre-set profile for that instrument. No need to even label wires! Of course, this would require the whole aftermarket audio and car makers to agree to some protocols. Using RCA's, car audio is stuck in the 50's. Live concert sound is at least up to the 90's now with IP networking.

Getting a bit off topic but...

I got something that fits in the glove box and plays the occasional CD a cd walkman. Take the glove box out and drill a hole in it and run a cable from the aux in port on the empeg. pop the glovebox back and stick a cheap and chearful cd walkman in there and you have cd playing capacity.

I have done this when i installed the empeg but never used it so ensure it is a cheap walkman as the batries will eventually leak and kill the walkman like mine did.

hi.

if I did that, I would power the discman (or similar device) from the cars battery, just like I do with my GPS, with a switch and a voltage regulator.

cu,
sven

I did something similar but have never used it... I just ran a 1/8" jack to RCA cable from the empeg to the storage space in my arm rest.... I drilled a hole in the arm rest to get it to work. I just thought MAYBE one day someone will have a MD player or something to hook up to it.

Some clarifications on Hugo's CES findings:
Sony:
Says it rips at 8x, but the one at CES only ripped at 2x (somebody timed it)
Seems to be able to load ATRAC files off the memory stick onto drive
Rips into ATRAC
I was told music wasn't getting off that drive
Will finish ripping CD after unit turned off. I assume you can rip while listening to something else.

Pioneer:
Must listen to CD while ripping - one rep said it'll rip CD, or sat radio
Will only rip RIAA CD's, probably must be in CDDB to be allowed to rip. A customed burned CD won't be ripped.
One person said it ripped to ATRAC, another said WMA

As mentioned before, Consumer-Electronics companies don't "get it" when it comes to compressed music and jukebox functionality. I also don't believe any consumer electronics company has the programming talent nor creativity to implement a compelling solution without buying it from someone else. These seem like strong statements, but they've held true over the years. The best shot in the consumer space at meaningful content has always come from European companies anyway. So don't hold your breath for seeing anything as compelling as the empeg come out of Japan.

Bruno