The empeg draws just over half an amp of current at peak (my measurement - YMMV). The big user of current isn't going to be the empeg but rather the amp(s) that the empeg is driving. With a large amp and playing loud music you could suck your battery dry after a while. How long that interveral is depends on your battery, it's state of charge, and the current pulled by the amp. I wouldn't think that short-term, loud music would be a problem but hours of music would be.
The VFD is not as high a resolution as a TFT display would be. It's not bad though - very legible outside of direct sunlight and it has some level of grey scaling so it's not on/off. A TFT would be a nice solution for a rev 2 empeg but I suspect that the engineering and costs (at empeg quantity levels) would make it prohibitive at least for a while.
Cheers,
=-Clarke
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List 351, empeg 00045, 10gb, Amber
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Queue 351,
Mk I, 30GB
Mk II #60000022 80gb, Blue - docked
Mk2a, 80GB, Bruface, lighted buttons and dial