Well I just got back from product/vendor training. They showed and explained all the new line of products from sony, kenwood, ect. and well with all the mp3 hard drive based thing that are comming to the market soon, empeg still rocks my world. The sony = mad gayness, and the kenwood is exactly the same as the phat noise. i just wanted impressed and i told the reps about how much better the empeg was and they were like "uh" becuase it did everything there products did time 10. I just love my machine

What sort of vendor training?

And did you see anything we haven't mentioned here before? We know about the Sony, The Kenwood/Phat thing, and a Pioneer (I think?). Anything else?

awia said they have plans for a hard drive based unit in the near future, but has yet to say anything. Pioneer did no have there present either.

http://www.storage.ibm.com/hdd/press/micro/20020319.htm

sounds promissing

When a Japanese company comes out with a similar product with such a feature rich UI, I suspect I'll be an old man (I actually suspect it will be never). I won't hold my breath. The big boys like Sony and Pioneer will no doubt OEM other people's work, just as Kenwood did.

Bruno