The "big bucks" on Ebay are fewer than you would've spent when these devices were new and still in production.

Sony and Pioneer have "competing" devices -- if you consider a device that is designed around digital rights management competition. Music goes on but it never gets out. More to the point, you have to rip all of your music there, in your car, on the Sony/Pioneer unit. Oh and did I mention that the Sony and Pioneer contraptions cost more than an Empeg on Ebay?