Yes to 002. They're saying this is the last major upgrade that will support the 002/3 family, though. Just as well. Have you ever checked out the converter noise level on those beasts? Might as well be recording at 16-bit for all the headroom they give you. Not to say they don't sound quite good. But an 002 will be by far the weakest link in your sound chain with PT 10. Heck, it is with PT 9.
Why so expensive? Because their stock is way down and they need a major cash infusion now or they die.
Seriously, though, it's a pretty major upgrade. I'm a little disappointed that it's a $300 whallop, but at least it's not a grand like the HD guys have to fork over. I never used 8, but I know that from 7 to 9, the whole program got sleeker, faster, more efficient, and more powerful. From the reviews I've seen, the move from 9 to 10 is similar. It's said to be like Pro Tools, only fast. That's due in part to the disk caching. But plug-ins are said to launch faster, too.
Russ Hughs claims it's faster than many 64-bit programs he's used. So they may have spent considerable resources on trimming down the code base. If so, that alone is worth $300 to me, never mind the disk caching, clip based gain, and fancy new channel strip. And other neat stuff. It's no minor update.
Also, part of the reason updates used to be ridiculously cheap is that we were tied to Digi interfaces. If you upgraded your software, it meant you'd already laid out considerable cash, and were likely to again in a few years. So we deserved a break. Now, you got a lot of guys who used an old interface to get 9 relatively cheaply to use it with third party hardware, and who have no plan to give Avid any money for anything but software henceforth and ever more. They gotta get paid for all that work on PT 10 somehow.