For those of you who are suggesting its all about the DSD capability, let me clarify.
The unit will upsample any signal coming into the unit via the USBII input. So, if you have a rebook CD file in FLAC, if your iPad, phone, Android device, etc....has the ability to play back FLAC or AIFF or whatever, the unit will upsample to at least 24/192 resolution.
I demonstrated that capability at IASCA finals to a number of people going from standard 16/44.1 playback to up sampled playback and it wasn't even close. Pretty impressive in up sampling mode. Dynamic range was increased substantially, depth ,width, height was way better in up sampling mode.
Like I said, its not for everyone. I will comment on the "unsafe" driving aspect of the unit. I has no problem in using the unit changing tracks or changing inputs while driving. All you need to do is pick up the remote and change volume, track up or down, mute, go to tuner or bluetooth the unit. Its all very simple.
Granted, a bigger screen would make a lot of people happy, and I have no doubt that Sony is probably going to look into building one.
As to the lower priced units in the near future, I am not betting on that to happen anytime soon. The DAC chips in this unit that must be used for the up sampling ability are the famous SABRE DAC ES9018 chips along with using an Asynchronous USB input which is capable of transmission of up to 192 Khz. Looking into the unit, if I was looking at this correctly, I was looking at separate power transformers for digital and analog sections of the unit. The internals are designed for maximum signal transfer with the cleanest signal possible given the size constraints of the unit.
Again, this unit is not for everyone, nor was it intended to be!