Best TT under $1k

this Pioneer Pl-61 is an excellent table to start out with. get a new cartridge (a Ortophon 2M blue for around $225) for this and you will be set for for a while.

https://www.ebay.com/itm/PIONEER-PL-61-Record-player-Turntable-beautiful-cabinet-vintage/18342857414...

The Pioneer PLX-1000 is a good deck. Any decent table will play fine as long as it is reasonably isolated and you make a good match with the cartridge. The cart resonance tool at Vinyl Engine is great for making sure you cart and tonearm are a good match. https://www.vinylengine.com/cartridge_resonance_evaluator.php

Next big step is cables and phono preamp. Cables from the preamp to amp don’t matter as much but from table to pre, you want to keep the capacitance low. Blue Jeans LC-1’s are cheap and effective.

There are a bunch of great entry level phono pre’s under $500 now if you want to go in that direction at some point. (Lounge LCR is my fav for the money... Sutherland for higher end... vintage for fun)

As long as you get a good match with your tonearm, you should be really happy with that table for most systems at that price point. In a year or two if you are thinking of moving up the range there’s lots to choose from under $2k (my recommendation is the GEM PolyTable http://www.hifigem.com/polytable.html)

Have fun!

@bpoletti 

“ I was told that to make a Rega perform, you have to add a lot of tweaks...”

That is simply untrue. The Regas I’ve had sounded great out of the box. True, certain tweaks may have enhanced performance, but this can be true of many tables. 

From your post, it seems your experience with Regas was  quite minimal. You had a few things go wrong and gave up citing “cheap parts, poor access, and substandard performance.”

My annoyance with your original post has little to do with the fact that you can’t stand Regas. You’re free to choose whatever table makes you happy. It’s the fact that you seem to go out of your way to denigrate them, leaving quite a few annoyed Rega owners in your wake. And after portraying Regas in the most derogatory terms, you kindly add “YMMV.” Thanks for that.

And, by the way, you’re not quite as funny as you used to be in your criticism. I found this quote of yours from The Vinyl Asylum:

“A rega arm does an excellent job roasting marshmellows. They slide right off the headshell. No other arm performs that well roasting marshmellows. Other arms are better relegated to the mundane task of helping to reproduce music, a characteristic mostly lacking from Rega products. “

That, I have to admit, was pretty funny. But you may want to learn the correct spelling of marshmAllows before your next helpful ROASTING about Regas.

Thanks so much for all of your replies. I'm leaning toward @helomech's suggestion of the Pioneer PLX-1000 with the Audio-Technica VM540ML cartridge.

I know it's not the most important consideration (perhaps not a consideration at all for some folks), but I love the old school look of the mk1200 and the plx-1000 is its successor.

I want to make an immediate purchase and most of the VPI HW-19's available right now seem to have missing parts or need work. There also seems to be a preference for buying vintage. While I love the idea - given my current knowledge of TT's - it doesn't seem practical.

Have you read this review on the Pioneer?

https://www.stereophile.com/content/gramophone-dreams-4-page-2

I usually don't care for his reviews but that one is accurate IME, having myself compared a 1200MkII with a PLX. I personally think the latter feels more substantial in overall build. One big advantage of the PLX is detachable phono cables. Some owners have reported loose tonearm bearings on their PLX, but that's a fairly easy adjustment with some patience. If you go the route of having the dealer install your cartridge, just request they give the whole tonearm assembly a thorough inspection prior to shipment.

Good news is the KAB Acoustics tonearm damper also fits the PLX tonearm - that, aftermarket headshells, phono cables, and Isonoe feet give you a path for future upgrades:

https://www.kabusa.com/td1200.htm

https://www.turntablelab.com/products/isonoe-isolation-system-turntable-feet-4-units

The only thing I dislike about Rega is the stock arm.  No VTA adjustment.  If you end up wanting to experiment with different cartridges later on (which you will) it's a pain to get them to sing without VTA adjustment.

Normally when I install a new cartridge it will take about 2 or 3 weeks to fine tune the VTA and make it sound its best.