I promised myself I wasn't going to get trolled into this, but I've got a few minutes to kill.


There's a number of alternatives on the market today that looks much more attractive.

And in every case, the alternatives are only attractive because they are cheaper. Not because they are better. Look closely at the features and specifications (as well as the reviews) of the alternatives.


For example, Aiwa CDC-MP3 in-dash player that plays CD-R disks with MP3s (in addtion to regular CDs and AM/FM) for less than $300 bucks!!!

Ah, case in point. Go check out Anandtech's review of the CDC-MP3 and you'll see that it needs to index the CD prior to playing it, resulting in a long pause (30 seconds or more, depending on the CD) before it spits out the first tune. Also, it pauses between tracks. The Empeg, on the other hand, boots very quickly and switches tracks instantly.

And you can only fit about 10 CD's worth of music onto a CD-R. This makes the CDC-MP3 an interesting replacement for a CD changer, but the Empeg's certainly got it beat in the capacity department.


I can put 10 MP3 CDs in my changer and have the same amount of music (6GB) as the base Empeg, but for 25% of the cost.

As the other gentleman pointed out, the changer won't read MP3s, only the head unit. So you're still stuck swapping discs (unless you only own 20 albums).


I just want to play MP3 music in my car and not mortgage my house to be able to do so.

And if that's all you want, then the CDC-MP3 will certainly do that cheaply. But I think you're missing the point about the Empeg.

You see, the fact that it plays MP3s is (to me) just a technicality. I don't own the Empeg so I can play MP3s. I own the Empeg so that I can play my entire album collection without swapping discs. The fact that it requires the MP3 format to get the job done is unimportant to me. Whatever the format, it's the only product that can do this for me.

I think that's the main "image" problem that MP3 car audio has right now: Most folks simply have a handful of Napster'd files they want to hear in their car. And products like the Aiwa will let them do it pretty cheaply. The Empeg seems like expensive overkill at that point. And for that crowd, I'd say the Empeg probably is too expensive, and it is overkill. But I'm not one of that crowd. For me, the Empeg is worth every penny.

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Tony Fabris