I have two questions,

Fisrtly I don't know much about car audio and am wondering what the situation with needing an amplifier to go with the empeg unit would be

and secondly,

from what i read on a different site, it said the empeg player came with a 2.1 gig hard drive and the space to add another. If your car was parked in a hot parking lot for five ir six hours, wouldn't it do some serious damage to the hard drives in your car?

Not speaking on behalf of empeg but...

1) yes you will need to get an amplifier... most normal car stereo's that you install have an amplifier built into them, however, the empeg does not... as a result of this you have two choices...
i) buy an amplifier - you connect the unit to the amp and the speakers to the amp
ii) connect the unit up to your existing head-unit (space may be a problem here, but you would use the amp in your existing unit

2) The actual size of the hard drive in the unit is up to you (there are several choices of HD size when you order, but getting to the point of your questio, the hard drives are rated to run up to 55 deg. C... this should be fine for most places in the world, and I believe that is the operating temperature of the drives, they may be able to take more heat if they aren't spinning, so if you think your car is hotter than 55 deg. when you get in it, turn on the a/c or drive around with the windows open for a while before turning the unit on.

Os




- Given two theories.... pick the one that sounds funniest -

I wouldn't worry too much about heat damage. The empeg has an operating range of 5 degrees to 55 degrees celsius (that would
be 41 degrees to 131 degrees Fahrenheit in "hard drive" mode; and a range of -20 degrees to +60 degrees celsius (-4 to +140 F)
in radio-only mode. The empeg has temperature monitoring circuitry that will prevent the hard drives from spinning up if these
temperature limits are exceeded. I don't know if these circuits will prevent the radio from working.

I live in Alaska, so my problem is the reverse of yours, but possibly more easily solved. I will have to work out some sort of external
heat source to warm my unit up from as cold as -50 degrees celsius (-58F) when the car is parked outside on a cold day.

There Ain't No Such Thing As A Free Lunch

Simple, quick answer to the Hard Drive temperature question. If you can take the heat in your car, then the empeg should be able to, at the very least when it is off, which it would be if your car was off, in a parking lot. I imagine you'll want to cool the interior of your vehicle down while you're inside it, unless you like sitting in 100 degree heat . Thusly you should be fine when you actually want to use it as well.

I've read in one of the forums that you can run the empeg unit of a suitable radio/cassette type unit which has it's own built in amp. So unless you're a real hi-fi nut it appears not mandatory not to use a separate amp (someone correct me if I'm wrong here).

-Rob

As I mentioned over in the installations forum, I have an Empeg unit connected to the line in of a Philips Carin 440 head unit and it works fine.

Ideally, the existing head unit needs to have a line input that can handle the 4V output from the Empeg unit. If you have a line input that can only handle lower voltages then it should be possible to drop the Empeg's output signal voltage using a pair of resistors forming a voltage divider on each channel, which I tried then found wasn't needed. Taking this a step further it *might* be possible to feed an existing head unit via one of those "plug your personal CD player into your head unit's tape slot with a pretend tape with a wire hanging out" gadget, though I doubt if the quality you'd get using that route would do the Empeg unit justice.

Cheers,

Mark.

...and in fact, Mike (mac on the board) drove home yesterday with his empeg on the passenger seat connected via a cigarette lighter adaptor and a cassette adaptor. He's not got round to doing a proper install yet...

Hugo

woah, i never knew you could do that. does the unit come with that adapter or does any regular adapter work?

Doesn't come with one, but a cheap radio shack one is what Mike uses. For the power in, you just need a 2.1mm DC power jack (+ve centre).

Hugo

One point you do need to be aware of with tape adaptors - a lot of decent tape decks have automatic tape slack cancelling. Basically, as you load a tape, the deck fast forwards until it 'feels' the non-driven tape reel start to move, then rewinds slightly in the same way. They do this to get rid of the big slack loops of tape you tend to get sometimes if the tape's been left kicking around for a while. Units that do this aren't compatible with tape adaptors, as the non-driven reel never actually moves in use. Try using one, and the unit'll probably spit the tape back out again after a few seconds, when it considers the (non-existant) tape's in danger of getting chewed.

Dominic

Cambridge Car Audio
http://www.cambscaraudio.co.uk

I had a tape adaptor that had a gear between the driven and non-driven reels.
I assume it is to avoid this problem.. It did cause a bit of extra noise though, so I had to turn it up a bit.. =)

However, make sure if it has autoreverse that you are playing the correct side.. =)

However, make sure if it has autoreverse that you are playing the correct side.. =)

Both of the ones I considered buying were "auto-reverse compatible" which I found a bit strange until Hugo explained why.

Yes it was a little noisy, more so than a normal tape I think. I just turned up the volume a bit more too... :-)



--
Mike Crowe
I may not be speaking on behalf of empeg above :-)

I'm a bit put off by this. I wanted a nice neat unit which would replace my existing car cassette player. The web site says 'Nothing in the boot', but where else am I going to put an amplifier? No way am I cutting holes in my dashboard or feeding wires through my beautiful new car. I'd love an in-car MPEG player but I want to just be able to pull out my old one and connect the new one to the exact same connectors (IEEE standard car stereo connectors). Are there any plans for such a unit?

There's little likelihood of that happening. There just isn't room inside the empeg to add all the circuitry and power supply electronics required for internal amplification, and even if there were, they would be opening up a big can of worms. How many watts? How many channels? You couldn't please everybody. The empeg is a high end system - it would appear to be a very high end sustem - and most people who are contemplating spending $2000 -- $3000 on a car stereo are already committed to amplifiers and high quality speakers and crossovers etc.

As to where to put the amplifier--- most amplifiers in the 50--200 watt range are reasonably compact - in the neighborhood of 10" by 6" by 2" (LWH) and will fit quite nicely underneath the passenger seat. As long as you're not trying to drive big boxes full of subwoofers, they won't generate too much heat for safety.

You will have to deal with the wiring situation - for that, I recommend a professional stereo shop. After all, you're spending $1500--$2000 for the empeg - what's another $100 or so to have the job done neatly, safely, and quicker and better than you could do it yourself?

tanstaafl.

"There Ain't No Such Thing As A Free Lunch"

Ahh, that explains a lot. I had no idea the EMPEG was so expensive. You're quite right - If I could afford one I could afford to get it professionally installed. But I can't afford one.

Anyone care to speculate on when a player that mere mortals might be able to afford will come out?

Not for a long time.... probably not until all the hardware that is in the EMPEG is significantly cheaper... unless you'd rather have a box in your boot in which case you could build one yourself...




- Given two theories.... pick the one that sounds funniest -

It's not that expensive - it starts at $1099 for one which is equivalent to a 50+ disc autochanger. Yes, you need an amp, but this can be had for $100+.

Hugo

That to me is stupid money for a car stereo, no matter how many hours music it holds. Given that the ambient noise level in a car is higher than 50% of the detail in the music, car stereos don't need to sound good. They need to be (a) cheap, (b) difficult to steal, and (c) loud. I understand that EMPEG is designed to be used in the home as well, which means it will need to sound good. So basically it just isn't for me. I'll wait until Nippon America bring one out for 30 quid.

For me, Cheap + Loud = Horrid....

If you want a loud car stereo, you want the head unit output to be as clean as possible, or else you'll just end up with amplified noise..
My car stereo sounds almost as good as my home setup (Cambridge audio with Eltax speakers), and it's very loud (If I choose to turn it up above 2/5 =)

The empeg isn't just a car stereo, it's a mobile computer.. =)
Jazz

But my point is that a car is such a noisy environment anyway that having a really good sounding stereo is a waste of money because the noise of the car masks any 'Hi-Fi' pretentions such a stereo might have. It might sound great when the engine's off, but as someone who spends most of his driving time on the motorways in England I have to say that at 70mph with the windows open one stereo sounds much the same as the next. And as someone who parks his car in the street in London, having any kind of expensive stereo equipment leads inevitably to broken windows and wires hanging out.

I've no doubt that the EMPEG is a good thing and that it sounds great. I just don't think that sounding great is at all important for a car stereo. What's important for me is that (a) you can hear it over the engine/wind/road noise and (b) it doesn't require any external (and therefore stealable) amplification. Sound quality is just not an issue, especially when you're using a compresion format that throws away a lot of the detail in the music. And from that point of view, a home MP3 player is a bit pointless because your CD player will sound better. I'd love an MP3 player in the car, but purely from the point of view of convenience. I can't see any other reason for MP3s to exist.

Mark.


Mark.

Someone saying that a car stereo doesn't need to sound good hasn't tried good sounding systems: eg, my CRX had factory-standard speakers. They sounded ok (maybe a bit weak and distorted at high volumes) until I heard some Infinity Kappas - with these in, the sound is OBVIOUSLY better, cleaner, smoother. Engine noise does mean that the audio doesn't need to be as good as "home" audio equipment, but it also means that you need decent speakers and good bass to make up for the inadequacies of a car as a listening environment, and give you the same sort of frequency response that you get at home.

Driving at 90 with the top down in my MX5 I can assure you that the kenwood speakers in the doors which replaced the stock mazda ones make a huge difference. Replacing the head unit with a better one in the AX GT I used to have also had a very notable effect.

External amplifiers are generally very non-stealable, as they're pretty securely screwed in and fitted in non-exposed locations (boot, under seats, etc), but sitting there in the dash saying "steal me". Ditto speakers, unless you plaster your car in stickers advertising the fact.

As for home listening - MP3s are just fine unless you're sitting, with your eyes closed, in front of a pair of really good speakers. Personally, I listen to music at home when I'm cooking, reading, having a party, whatever. Convenience is a big issue there too - I just use my empeg at home, I simply can't be bothered to dig out a new CD every time one finishes playing, and I've got several hundred of them.

The empeg being totally removable (and usable at home) hopefully lends itself to the not-being-stolen argument. If it ain't there, you can't steal it.

Hugo

Oh no, I've tried good-souding systems. And they sound good. I just don't see the point. When I'm driving I'm concentrating on driving, not on the music. So I don't notice if it's clean or smooth or punchy. When I'm at home, on the other hand, I do notice these things because when I'm at home I listen to the music. Your assertion that MP3s are 'fine' doesn't cut any ice with me. As a semi-pro musician I'm used to hearing my gorgeous-sounding mixes on CD, and I'm used to hearing those lovely mixes sound like my morning toilet exertions when converted to MP3. Oddly, the terms 'clean and smooth' that you use are exactly the words I would NOT use to describe MP3s. So you can see why I don't regard the sound quality of an MP3 player as paramount.

External amplifiers are far more stealable than normal car stereos. Why? External amplifiers don't have security codes or removeable fascias. I speak from bitter experience. Thieves took my freind's amps (one in the locked glove box and one under the seat) and speakers (8) but left the coded stereo. And we'd only finished fitting it all an hour previously.

Anyway, I seem to have started something I didn't intend to. I hope EMPEG does well, because if it catches on it will hopefully lead to the kind of player I'm looking for. And I support anything that used ARM processors. However I regard MP3 as a format which has convenience as its one and only virtue alongside a host of faults, and therefore I'm not prepared to pay more for an MP3 player than I would for a conventional stereo.

Mark.

Hum, I find music helps me concentrate on driving (nothing like a bit of Prodigy to help fast driving ;) ). Ok, your ears are probably better than mine, but I find even 128kbit MP3s usefully nice sounding - the main problem has always been that PC sound cards generally (with some notable exceptions) sound awful as they're built to hit price points, not quality.

Still, you could always go for 320kbit MP2's, which are pretty damn near the original waveform (ie, as used by DAB).

Convenience is a HUGE point when it comes to music collections though, which is why I love my empeg so much :)

Hugo

I have to admit I've been experimenting withn 320KBit MP3s and they are, as you say, very good. My assertion was based on the 96KBit MP3s I've been making for the web, which do sound truly awful.

It still troubles me as to why, if Creative Labs (of all people) can make an MP3 walkman that fits in your wallet, can't somebody make an in-car one with a built-in amplifier? I think I'll just have to hope that some company, inspired by EMPEG's success, builds me the unit I want. Until then I shall be patient and I wish you all many happy hours of listening to your high end sounds.

Mark.

The problem with the mp3 walkman idea, is that you get about 30 mins of decent audio, unless you want to spend hundreds on flash cards or micro drives..
You could probably put an amp in an empeg sized device (I have an old Panasonic 30 watt sitting at home which is the size of a 2.5 inch HD) if designed it with only one HD slot.. However, you'll run into problems with heat and also computer device interference...
My JVC head unit has an option to turn off the internal amp to reduce these problems, which I do, as I use a big external amp...
Jazz

96kbit MP3s are not good - however, even 128 is a big improvement. A lot of people use 192, but the "sweet spot" of mp3 is probably 128 (ie best trade-off for space and quality).

A unit with a built in amp isn't out of the realms of possibility - we could do it, but you'd only be able to fit one drive in there...

Hugo

After reading your posts about sound quality (which I do agree with to some extent), I come across wanting a built in amp. Honestly, almost any deck with a built-in-amp pales in comparison to even the same deck with a good external amplifier. To each his own...
As Altman stated before me the major attraction of the empeg (besides linux, ARM, the blinking lights...) is convienence, having a HUGE assortment of music always with you.

Jake

Otherwise empeg is a company that formed just to make a massive car mp3 jukebox as it were. This is their first product so maybe later. <--Comments empeg Crew?

I wouldn't consider this question either simple or quick.
If he lives in Texas (or somewhere similar), and the car is sitting in the sun all day, the temperatures inside the car can reach over 180 degrees (farenheit). That's HOOOOOOOTTTTT!!!!! by anybody's standards.Hot enough to cook meat anyway. And that's just the air temperature. Surface temperatures of surfaces in direct sunlight can go over 240. So his question about heat is entirely relevant.

I've had a problem with my empeg. When it gets really hot and sticky in the car, the bottom button sticks "in" and then i'm forced to use the remote to change my play list. I'm going to have it replaced because the other 3 buttons don't do that. i think i have a dud button.


-CHiP

This is quite often just the front panel flexing: if you loosen the bottom left screw holding the front panel in by 1/4 of a turn, you may well find the problem goes away - sometimes they're done up too tight. Obviously, if the switch is faulty we'll replace it though.

Hugo

Mark wrote:

My assertion was based on the 96KBit MP3s I've been making for the web, which do sound truly awful.

I've found that the encoder you use can make a hell of a difference. BladeEnc and the Fraunhofer encoder sound pretty similar at 128KBit, but at 56KBit BladeEnc isn't even worth considering. AudioCatalyst's Variable Bit Rate is great to cut down file sizes without sacrificing too much quality (I've found I can trust AudioCatalyst's idea of what sounds OK).

Compaq, working with someone else, are making a Personal Jukebox that has a hard disk in-built. Of course, you can't get larger models, you get none of those pretty visualisations, you have to accept that you'll be passed by when the latest audio formats come out (except if you buy another unit), and you have to hope that Compaq's way of ordering playlists and so forth are the way you wanted to do it. Oh, and you don't get equalisation, you still have to buy an amplifier for a car, and I don't know if it has a radio tuner. They only cost a couple of hundred dollars less than an empeg unit, so you might be better off if you can accept the limitations...

Ultimately, you choose what you play with. The empeg is not the unit for everyone, and if you don't find its features useful then don't buy it. But the fact that you're still having a look around indicates to me that you're as fascinated by the idea as I was when the site was first launched...

Of course, my brother owns the unit that I sat in line for (but that's another story :-)

Save the whales. Feed the hungry. Free the mallocs.