What seems to mean the most to me is that there is not one single post from Tony Fabris in this thread. He, in my opinion, has the most cause to feel ripped off.

Heh, the reason I haven't been posting the last couple of days is simply a technical one. With the BBS getting slashdotted, I was literally unable to make any posts at all, even when I wanted to. There were several technical questions on the BBS that I haven't been able to answer, and now I don't know which ones they were.

To respond to your implication: I certainly don't feel ripped off at all. Just because SB isn't making any more car players doesn't make the existing players any less than what they are. They are still the best product of their kind, and I'm glad I own mine.

This will be my car stereo for many years to come. I know that official support will exist for the car players for as long as they've got warranties, and unofficial support will continue indefinitely, in the form of shared information here on the BBS or elsewhere on the internet. Even if there is a catastrophic failure of one of my units, I know that I'll be able to fix it even if it involves taking a soldering iron to it myself. And it would be worth it, too.

As far as the future is concerned: As I understand it, the Empeg team will continue to make great products for SonicBlue, using the same technologies that we've seen demonstrated in the car player. I know that 2.0 WILL happen, so there's no need to worry about that.

The only real remaining question is VR.

Well, if the OEM deals come to fruition, then I'll bet VR is still going to happen. My reasoning? I think that in-car VR is going to be the must-have gadget of the future. The OnStar system is a great example. More and more car makers will be offering those kinds of options, and those who don't have it will be left out in the cold.

And if Empeg does VR for a car manufacturer, they've gotta test it in the real world, right? Well, how better to test it than to give it to an existing user base? Personally, I think VR still has a high probability of happening.

___________
Tony Fabris

why are you supposed to feel ripped off ? are you secretly a major investor or something :-)

32Gig MK2 In 2001 VW Golf TDI

Online companies are getting tight about the address you supply, being the same as the one where your credit card bill is sent to. Too much fraud.

I routinely have high cost items sent to my parents home, one or the other is home most of the time.

The trick is to call your credit card customer service number and register a shipping address against your account. It works wonders to be able to tell the order desk that your preferred shipping address is registered with the card company.

claims that my billing address doesn't match my credit card's address

WOW bummer, yes I'm saddened & mad well a whole range of emotions coming home to read this. I'm kinda wondering why it wasn't in 'announcements' cat. but oh well to be put in 'general' cat. is an understatement. I for one don't feel cheated, as one poster commented we are all guinea pigs in a sense, my car still has bugs & TSB's and it's a potential hazard if something is wrong w/it. The empeg may have never seen the light of day had they never come forward w/ the unit publicly or had people give ideas, as I see it was pretty much done when it was created. I've been to the Slashdot site, admittedly while I've never heard of the site before now, voiced some of my opinions or should say gave my reasons for backing such a product & why it was worth it for me. I bought the base line product 12Gig (figuring I'd update the HDD when prices fell), I find it was still worth it to me even w/the acused high price. There was nothing like this out when I bought mine & won't be for quite awhile, though the package will be different I feel like Pioneers HDD CD player will be close. Barring any horendous accidents my empeg will be playing for quite some time, I would like to see the voice recognition to come out, I doo feel that this should be finished. While not necessarily promised or included I have read about it so much I want it & I feel it would've really push the capabilites very far.
I feel as another poster mentioned that Rio's portables aren't not what people really want it's just what the general public is being fed at the moment as what they should have. Unfortunately too few people realized the potential of this product to keep it going although I don't personally think SB gave it much of a chance at all, it's been what, 8-9 months? I know the customers are out there as human nature they were waiting for a sort of finalization of the product, afterall it didn't have even atuner yet, what did SB expect! When SB bought empeg, I imagined they would redesign the empeg making it less costly, using more mass produced manufacturing methods & buying power. Rather, it looks like, they thought it would be a quick bump in their sells pinned on a hopeful MP3 car in-dash craze that has been slow to develop. SB didn't really put much into the development that I saw, though I couldn't see much of what really went on. Personally I don't think it's a geek product just because it uses a computer & Linux it's the beginning of what the future will be like anyway as far as I'm concerned. I really believe that the right company could've sent the empeg through the roof. Get the manufacturing price down via mass production methods but keeping the same look & feel leaving just the software side to devlop new things & plugins to sell for more versatility.

Well here's to the future whatever it may bring, thanks guys for a piece of history that changed how I listened & accessed my music. I commend the developers for reaching the staus they have so far, their hard work is very apparent in their product & support of it, very rare. I don't see this as an end though & hope to see the evolution of it all.

#695-Mk2/8 colors-12Gig w/Tuner- awaits v2.x & Voice Recog.

I guess once that comes out, thats our replacement.

Not for me... I get at least as much satisfaction (if not more) from hacking my empeg as from it performing its primary function. The consensus seems to be that the empeg only happened due to some freaky accident and it'll be a cold day in hell before something similar happens again.

I'm also on the should-I-buy-a-spare fence but it's shaking uncontrollably and I'm not sure I can hold on for much longer.

Borislav

Borislav: "I'm also on the should-I-buy-a-spare fence but it's shaking uncontrollably and I'm not sure I can hold on for much longer."

OK, but the question is: Which way are you going to fall??

I, too, have been thinking about this all day. Money is tight, however. My conclusion? When SonicBLUE offers a discount of $100-$150 to existing Empeg (I'm glad I never got used to calling them Rio-Whatever) owners, then I'll buy an "insurance" unit. I figure that's more than they'll get from reseller/liquidator types, and a purchase price of $850 would make me feel better about making the leap given the uncertain, melancholy circumstances. Failing that, I'll just cross my fingers. The notion has some attraction. If I had a 2nd unit, I could just leave it on the boat during the warm, less humid (less corroding!) months.

Jim

I am shocked, and yet I fully understand that the rest of the world is not quite ready for the future.
:-|

THANKS for making a bit of Geek History and letting us share that with you.

THANKS for making the empeg real for all of us GEEKS out there !!!

Thanks for producing my epmeg




-- MK2, 36G, blue, 080000398 --

Online companies are getting tight about the address you supply, being the same as the one where your credit card bill is sent to. Too much fraud.

Yes, but it seems they (or authorization SW at the card issuer) do matching using some quite unforgiving algorithm. I have several purcheses denied because of this, although I am on my current address for the last 40 years and never used any other either for registering credit cards or as shipping address...

Dragi "Bonzi" Raos
Zagreb, Croatia
Q#5196, MkII#80000376, 18GB green

I was silent when my number came up
   because I did not have enough money
I was silent when the queue was abandoned
   because Empeg was producing from stock
I was silent when the Mk2 was released
   because I hadn't convinced my wife yet
I was silent when the empeg became the riocar
   because I thought it would become even more available

Now all I can do is *sob*

(with apologies)
David T-G
davidtg at justpickone dot org


:-D
--
David T-G

In my mind, the problem is always the same:

When a big compaany aquires a small company , everyone says it's good for the small company to be acquired.

But there is an example now, it is NOT.

Empeg built the MOST powerful, flexible, and amazin product for the next five years.

If they(Empeg team ) haven't been acquired by SB, their product will be still more expensive that now but Quality must be PAID.

You will never see a consumer product in which you could put your hands and make your software and get technical infos and tips.

I want to believe that they will do their best to continue what they are doing now but il will be different.

I am almost sure thazt in the Next monthes SB will sell a Empeg III (Ameliorate Empeg II) with a different name but with less flexibility than Empeg II.

They just xanted to acquire GOOD TECHNOLOGY after that .....


Even all that, EMPEG is still the Best Geek Team Ever Seen (as now :-) ) and we can trust them for future plans.

Conclusion :

It is better to stay as a small company with the serious you had than to be pushed by the Economic Rules.
Market Rules the World.

You are tied Now.

I'll Strike From the Grey

He's definitely a major investor in time and energy put into trying to make this product mainstream.
A lot of things may not have happened if it wasn't for Tony.

I don't personally feel slighted. I knew going in that this was the best ultra-geek toy in the world and with that comes certain things such as possible obsolescence, beta software or failure.
I was willing to except those drawbacks just to have one. I don't think to many owners would think twice about running what empeg calls "beta" software on their unit for the promise of being just that much cooler. I think they did an outstanding job of keeping the software stable.

I'm just examining the other point of view.
Plus, I know I'm not going to be able to fix my empeg if it breaks and hopefully the community will be here to offer some support in that regard, even if it requires shipping my unit around the world at my expense.

The thought of living with out it at any point in the future is a trembling thought. How could I readjust to the way I used to flop CDs around and mostly listen to the same 3-5 over and over again?

Scary.

Hmm,
If they were to offer a $150 discount to existing owners, it would definitely push me over the edge to getting another one. I am getting ready to order another sled, power supply, remote, and I would like a blue face plate...

Were they to offer the discount, it would be like getting an empeg for $600 for me, as I am already planning on dropping $200 on accessories anyways...

-Trevor

-----
Mk 2, Green 12GB, Tuner 080000349

A lot of things may not have happened if it wasn't for Tony.

Aw, shucks.

I don't think I did anything that wouldn't have been done by somebody else. I just enjoyed my little MP3 hobby and did what I could to help others.

There are a lot of other people on this BBS who are major contributors, too. They just don't post quite as much.

___________
Tony Fabris

...or have pagers linked to the board to be notified when a new post is made... Sorry, but that is way beyond anything I have seen before!!!

Paul G.
SN# 090000587 (96GB Smoke)

Edited by pgrzelak on 26/09/01 07:33 PM.

True. I've only got mine for a week, but I'm seriously considering buying a second one. Simply to put it on the shelf in case something might happen to the first one (be it theft, an accident, me dropping it or anything else that makes it stop working). I would also have everything in backup then (remote - probably the first thing to go, AC adapter and car bay)

I certainly don't feel screwed over by Empeg, I'm sure that if it could be any other way they would do it. I (and I'm sure many others with me) am just sad that something as wonderful as this has come to an end. Now the top of the bill mp3 product for the car will be the NEO. God forbid, I've been there and it does not even touch the Empeg's heels.

Riocar 10gig (for now) S/N : 10101747 amber

so basically if i don't buy a tuner in the next 2 months i am not going to be able to, is that what you are saying?

Hugo wins the sensitivity award. Rob...you lose!

I'm entitled to any opinion I want to have...and if I want to feel screwed over...I can feel screwed over. Only time will tell over the coming months/years how screwed over we/I are with this turn of events. As people's Empeg's start to break down...and they can't get them fixed...and they sit there looking at a $2000 piece of metal and plastic.....maybe their tunes will change dramatically. Or..maybe I'm wrong and there will turn out to be a way to keep our Empeg's running for a long long time. Only time will tell. But my experience says that kind of support will NOT exist. I for one, did not buy a $2000 car stereo that I intended to only use for a year or two.

I'm sure the guys in Cambridge are very proud of the MK1 and Mk2. Its a great unit. As I said before, I love mine (as long as it keeps working). However, regardless of whether you like to admit it or not...the fact is...you SOLD OUT. You sold your software to Rio and Rio promptly shelved this great product. You sold out man!

Rob...don't be defensive. Just prove me wrong in years to come.

cheers

No, tuners will be available until stock is exhausted; at that point, if there is demand we may be able to get another production run sorted out. The stock may last a lot longer than we expect (not all owners need or want a tuner).

BUT; if you have a need for a tuner, the best thing to do is to order one sooner rather than later.

Hugo

Looks like lots of people are venting their ire, feeling betrayed and generally pissed off and pissing on the folks at empeg/SB.

Not me. I was an early Mk1 owner, upgraded to the MkII when it came out and now I've just gone ahead and bought a MkIIa and some accessories. The folks at empeg created, built and sold a great product - the empeg/Rio Car.

The fact that SB bought the empeg team shows great insight an forethought. Rob, Hugo, Rodger and the others really believe in the product (which is really the software) and have been here from day-1 supporting the user community in an incredible fashion.

I for one trust that when we need them, Hugo and the others will be there still for this community. I've had three empeg's - I still own two. Now I'm about to add a "spare" Rio Car to my collection.

Say what you will - SB realizes the outstanding team that they got when they bought empeg. We are sure to see some interesting stuff come from that team in the times ahead. I know that everytime I use my empeg(s) that I'm grateful to Hugo for having the foresight to build such a wonderful product and make it available to people like me.

=-Clarke

______________________________________
Queue 351, Now Mk II #60000022 18gb, Blue

There are certain commercial realities that sometimes rule out the "stay as a small company" option.

Rob

Which is why they killed their primary product showcase?

That doesn't make any sense.

Paul.

Paul Haigh, Reg. 4120
(mk1) 6GB, Blue, 00254
(mk2) 12GB, Red, 00357

Like the:

buy 'em and put 'em out of business
or
attempt to buy 'em, fail, and then put them out of business buy selling same product at a loss, until smaller company runs out of cash.

Microsoft are great examples of both approaches (which are valid business decisions).

Paul.

Paul Haigh, Reg. 4120
(mk1) 6GB, Blue, 00254
(mk2) 12GB, Red, 00357

More like the "oh dear, manufacturing stuff means you have hideous cashflow problems and if you don't get some money in somehow, you're going titsup.com".

Cashflow in a growing business is a huge challenge!

Hugo

Well I certainly didn't sell anything, having no stake or executive involvement in empeg.

Hugo and Steve made a commercial decision which was strongly influenced by dedication to the product and customers. You speak as though they became millionaires (*laughing old loud*). The other options available at the time would have resulted in the EOL announcement happening much sooner - the decision that was made was the best chance the product had.

In any case, the EOL of the product around this time has ALWAYS been on the cards - it's time for a new model. People here have been saying that for some time. The decision that has been made is that the new model will not be sold by SONICblue, we'll just stick to creating it.

Rob

I had an earlier post about little time SB spent w/the empeg as the webpage shows http://www.riohome.com/BuyOnline.htm it 'just arrived' and is already departing!

#695-Mk2/8 colors-12Gig w/Tuner- awaits v2.x & Voice Recog.

This is for Rob, Hugo, everyone else involved with the empeg past and present.

I take my hat off to you guys. You have created the most wonderful and practical MP3 product in existence. I was convinced that you'd created the Harrier Jump Jet of the MP3 world, so advanced that it would take some time [maybe years] to catch on.

It took much longer than you thought to do it, heck I joined the queue back in January 1999 [within 30 seconds from when I first saw the product on your website and when the Mark 1 was sort of being made] and wondered if I'd ever see any unit at all before the hundreds/ no thousands in the queue ahead of me [judging by the queue number I was assigned] got theirs - even allowing for a 50-80% drop out rate between joining the queue and leaving it.

There was nothing else like it, even by August 2000 when I finally ordered my units.

So, I bought 2 of the 12GB MK2 units - 1 for me & the 2nd one for my wifes car.

My wife was absolutely stoked when I showed her what I just spent several grand of my money on [in whatever currency you care to name] and about 3 times the UK Pound cost in New Zealand dollars - i.e. a lot of money.

Even though it was a surprise to her as she didn't know it was coming, she sure could see how cool/useful it was to have every CD in our collection in the car available on demand without limitations.

So, she was won over instantly and I hadn't even showed her the cool stuff in it like playlist management or other things not even considered by us mere mortals but which had been thought about and then implemented by Hugo and the others at Empeg in the software.

I was even more stoked than my wife when I found out the empegs worked better than I thought - unusual as that was for a near 'new' product.

One of the key reasons why I bought the empeg was due to its inherent design - using Linux as the base os makes sense, adding Ethernet, USB serial etc makes it easy to upgrade and connect to computers and other devices [like Sony Stalk controllers] and more importantly the whole design was upgradeable and designed to be hackable/extendable - either by yourself or by others.

The processor is very over specced for what the empeg does now, but that gives lots of head room for advanced functionality, be that GPS navigation, VR or whatever else someone else cares to think up. This has been borne out so far and will continue for some time yet I think.
We have had at least 3 software releases [1.01 and 1.02, 1.03] with 2.0 nearly here. I can't think of any device that has been improved simply by adding new software than the empeg has been in the short time I have owned it.

Now, as you can imagine, when putting lots of money down on any expensive toys you pays your money and takes your chance.

I have plenty of such things lying around my house from the last 10 years.

Heck I now have 2 Tivos as once I got the first one, it wasn't enough for me to have my own, so now we have his and her Empegs and his and her Tivos
I've spent at least as much on empegs thus far as I have on VCRs, TV's, Video Tapes, DVD players, DVDs. My CD collection cost nearly as much as empegs did over the years.
I own 3 working VCRs and have several older ones lying around the house.

When [and I say when, not if], Tivo goes bust/Chapter 11 etc, will I be complaining to Tivo about how I've been shafted as I own 2 of their devices? No way.

So now the Empeg has been EOL'd its a sad day, but its a case of the one door closing and many more doors opening...

If you were to ask me, imagine empeg had never been invented what sort of features would you like implemented in your next high-end car stereo system, and who should do it?

I would be hard pressed to think of a better team than Hugo & co to do the next generation of feature rich in-car products even if only as OEM products.

Yes they might not have Ethernet and Serial and other interfaces for cost and other reasons, but the software inside them will be excellent, with hooks and backdoors to allow others to be able to re-use them for other functions and features and/or have a UI that has been well thought out & researched, not just "market researched" by the marketing department.

I am more than willing to beta test any future products these guys produce [show me the NDAs, I'll sign] - and when what they make finally makes it to the outside world as a main stream product I will probably buy one to replace or augment my empegs - who by then will have had 2-3+ years of everyday use.

So, lets keep it all in perspective for a minute, would you prefer to have lived in a world where there never was a empeg and we still had CD juke boxes in the trunk?

Or even worse - a world where access to music you bought was only via a carefully controlled system of licenses and rental arrangements and you had to keep re-purchasing the same music every few years as formats change?

No way - I'd much rather it the way its turned out. Maybe things could have been even better but we'll never know how much better now and in any case nothing lasts forever, sooner or later the empegs would have stopped being made.

Its just happened sooner than later, but I'm very glad it did happen at all.


I'm awaiting my [just ordered] tuners and will consider buying a backup empeg in case one of my 2 gets stolen or damaged.

So I guess I'll have spent more money on these things than a lot of people who only bought 1 empeg which by some measures ought to give me a lot of reasons to complain/feel unhappy.

My real sadness is reserved for those who have not yet had a empeg experience, nor are likely to now. I have yet to meet anyone I've ever shown the empeg to who has not been immediately impressed with it. The price puts them off a little but if it was factory fitted in their car they wouldn't think twice about the cost - and maybe thats the reason for SB to have done what they did - make the product part of the original car and everyone can afford to have the empeg.

One day I hope these people may come close to what we have experienced with the future yet to be released products that Hugo and others are working on.

So, keep those new products coming guys - I look forward to them knowing that they will be worth it in the long run.

In the meantime, I have my empegs to use until then.

A fully loaded empeg in the car is better than hundreds of CDs in the house!

I guess I'll chime in with my "me too" comment.

I love my empeg.
It is the best thing I have ever bought.
I will enjoy it until the day it breaks / is stolen.

I can't feel screwed over. I bought a wonderful product. Very few products last forever in the same form. Sure, the Mini didn't change much for 40-something years, but that's rare.

We weren't guinea pigs. The only things that we were used for were for what we can see already: an amazing product revision (Mk2), and a hopefully very advanced software upgrade (provided we get it). You can also be sure that we'll get v2. I don't see why they'd go to the trouble to do the work and then not release it after several releases to the Alpha testers.

BE HAPPY!! ENJOY YOUR MUSIC!!

One last thing: recently I bought the credit card-sized Rex 6000 micro-pda. I love it. I bought it the day after I heard it was being discontinued. I realized that the product fit my life perfectly, and was the only solution for me. Now that I have it, I use it every day, all the time. It's my second favorite gadget (next to the empeg). Am I dissapointed that it will be damn hard to find another if this one breaks? yeah! but I'll enjoy it for now, and that's what matters.

I love my empeg.
I can't give all you Cambridge folks enough thanks for your marvelous product and support. We all appreciate the hard work you've put into this.

THANK YOU!!!


DiGNAN
Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da, etc.

Yeah. What he said.

___________
Tony Fabris

Undeniably, this is disappointing news; no doubt about it.

The Empeg, Ltd. staff members are a wonderful mix of people, and demonstrated the best customer support and service I've ever had the privilege to experience. No Exceptions. They are a group who definitely believed in, and stood behind, the product they sold.

The empeg-car was profitable, Hugo has said as much, however, it wasn't sufficiently profitable to keep. Sad, but true. Excellent, well made, products are hard to find, and, harder still, to keep. It is my hope that I'll be able to enjoy my empeg until that sad day when it finally dies.

For whatever it's worth, in my opinion, the news of the SB buyout of Empeg Ltd. marked the beginning of the end. It was the "Handwriting on the wall", so to speak. Although there were numerous assurances that it would be 'business as usual'; no one can deny, at the very least, the thought crossed their mind that this would be the end of the empeg-car. Think about it, we've seen it all too often; "Embrace, Extend, Extinguish". Even now, we see this going on with CD's themselves.

It's funny how you can think all these lofty things about 'voting with your dollars' (meaning, support those suppliers who provide the best product or service), and it doesn't seem to do any good.

... so let it be with empeg.

Dudeman42: "I'm entitled to any opinion I want to have...and if I want to feel screwed over...I can feel screwed over......you SOLD OUT. You sold your software to Rio......"

Dude,

You are indeed entitled to any opinion you want to have. Little green men trying to penetrate your tin-foil hat with their evil mind-control rays?? Hey, I'm down with that.

My opinion of Rio/SonicBLUE's eptness might just be as low as anybody's on this BBS, and my disappointment that the open-ended Empeg Mk2/3 will spawn no more is probably as great as anyone's, but I'd suggest that, before you stage a mini-WTO riot here, ....DO THE FRIGGIN MATH! Can you spell "cash flow"? Have your read Rob and Hugo's patient explanations of events as they unfolded over the past year? I guess I can understand your bitter feelings ....I just have to assume that your expectations are a notch different from mine and that you have perhaps been walking around with your eyes closed.

As seriously disappointed as I was by the EOL news, I have to say that I am still pleased to own an Empeg. Yeah, the future is uncertain, and I'm not sure I can afford a "spare", but I still want to thank Hugo, Rob, Steve et al for producing this marvel. I look forward to version 2.0. If circumstances dictate that I move *back* on to my sailboat to weather the current recession, it will be fantastically great to have all of my music available while my CD collection sits in dead storage. Yeah, I hope my Empeg doesn't break. Yeah, I hope Hugo will be there if it does. Yeah, only time will tell.

If you're still hopelessly pissed off to the point that you may never enjoy your Empeg ever again, I have a solution: Open it up, take out the severely depreciated commodity components (i.e. the hard drives) and send it to me. I will send you $600 via Paypal. Does this work? Would this help you move on?

Geeez, you think you got problems. Wanna help me find somebody to install the Empeg in my DeLorean????

Jim