Clearaudio Concept with Satisfy Tonearm or Technics 1200 GR

I have had both and was able to compare them directly.

 I had a Clearaudio Concept but with the Verify arm for about 7 years. It's a nice looking deck and sounds good too. However mine required the platter bearing to cleaned re-oiled quite frequently (factory supplied oil) or it would gradually lose speed.

 I now have the Technics SL1200GR and for me it's a much better TT.

It has a noticeably blacker background, more dynamic and overall sounds better. 

Removal headshell making it easy to swap cartridges. 

Zero speed issues and the platter starts and stops way faster.

Antiskate and VTF are adjustable via dials on top of the deck. On the Concept to change VTF you have to get underneath the table.

Th only thing that I don't like are the blue LED lights. They are very bright when the room is darkened. I remedied that by covering the lights with white electrical tape cut to size so it's not very noticeable. 

Hope that helps!

This absolutely helps!!!!!!
This is exactly the feedback I was looking for.
Can't thank you enough.
I suppose using the satisfy tonearm may go some way to improve Concept (at least from what I read) but even then it sounds like 1200gr is the way to go.   Also, form what I understand there are a series fo treaks to imorive the sound even further by swapping out the mat (Achromat seem to be the one many recommend) and the heashell.
Out of curiosity do you use a record weight with yours?

VPi sells replacement motors which can be swapped out in minutes.  You might not need an interim TT

The upper end Clearaudios are good tables, but the entry level Concept is nothing special. Subjectively, the 1200GR competes well against belt-drive tables in the $3.5K-$5K range. The Concept competes well against other <$2500 belt-drives.

Objectively, the GR’s measured performance is as good or better than that of most belt-drives around and above the $10K price point, for example, the SME12.

Once you get your Aries repaired and can conduct a level-matched comparison with the GR, you might just end up with the latter as your “main” rig. 

@pgastone 

I haven't tried any other mats, I do use a turntable clamp and I did notice an improvement. The only other tweak I have done is add a KAB tonearm damper and to be honest I'm not sure if it made any difference.

This is great, thank you!

@testpilot 

Yes absolutely- it should be am easy fix- this is just pushing me to pull the trigger on a 2nd turntable for my more modest office system.

@newfzx7 

Right, very good to know re record weight.  And I will be very curious to compare the technics.

The other I idea I had toyed with was a Sota Sapphire- but older ones would almost certainly need to be tuned-up, have springs replaces etc.  However, the attractive side to Sotas is that they have an upgrade path to bring their decks to state of the art.  But in the end I just think a simpler solution is probably best.   This was just an aside btw.