I tried uping it to 1024 and got this. I will mess around some more with diffrent values...
BTW it worked when i switched it back to 32, and normally i use the --usb option with emptool.
was trying to "keep it simple" :)

[root@dave empeg-car]# emptool --debug 3 /dev/empeg-car
2000 Checking connection [ 0% mpeg-pump v0.03 (19980601)\x0d
2000 Checking connection [Done
2121 Downloading
2121 Starting download [Done
2122 Retrieving tags index [Done
2123 Retrieving databases [ 0% imeout in state 3 (substate=7567)
!LOCAL_DROPOUT!timeout in state 3 (substate=7567)
!LOCAL_DROPOUT!timeout in state 3 (substate=7567)
!LOCAL_DROPOUT!timeout in state 3 (substate=7567)
!LOCAL_DROPOUT!timeout in state 3 (substate=7567)
!LOCAL_DROPOUT!timeout in state 3 (substate=7567)
!LOCAL_DROPOUT!timeout in state 3 (substate=7567)
!LOCAL_DROPOUT!timeout in state 3 (substate=7567)
!LOCAL_DROPOUT!timeout in state 3 (substate=7567)
!LOCAL_DROPOUT!timeout in state 3 (substate=7567)
!LOCAL_DROPOUT!timeout in state 3 (substate=7567)
!LOCAL_DROPOUT!timeout in state 3 (substate=7567)
!LOCAL_DROPOUT!timeout in state 3 (substate=7567)
!LOCAL_DROPOUT!timeout in state 3 (substate=7567)
!LOCAL_DROPOUT!timeout in state 3 (substate=7567)
!LOCAL_DROPOUT!timeout in state 3 (substate=7567)
!LOCAL_DROPOUT!
4010 Failed to receive database, result -2101