new to me turntable and preamp

With $ being an issue, I highly recommend buying used. But, it will help if you know what you want or what you're looking for and looking at.

The Systemdek IIX can be a great buy. There's one available now for $500 or so that I would consider.

I'm pretty bored by the Rega, MMF, etc. etc. tables.

You're really putting together a combo of ttable base, arm and cartridge. If any one of the three sucks, the whole thing sucks. At a reasonable price, I'm a big fan of Grado cartridges. They sound really nice, work well with most mid range tonearms.

thanks for the input, it funny cause all the new sales sites rant and rave about the rega and pro-ject stuff, at least as far as the entry level stuff goes, but when i started reading on here seems most guys like the older stuff.
just found a denon dp-40f on ebay that looks well cared for, pretty sharp looking too. not real fond of the whole ebay auction thing though.

Ebay is hit or miss. You may find some great steals over there, but the people who sell over here are, on the whole, much more likely to have cared for their gear.

MusicDirect sells a Denon DP-300F for $329. Slightly less than the entry-level Rega and ProJect tables. These are all good tables at their price (I'd probably take the Rega if I had to choose between the 3 tables).

Remember, though, the the magic is in the setup. Don't ignore "trivial" advice such as "Make sure your turntable is level..." Pay attention to the details and you will be rewarded.

What component is currently doing duty as the phono amp? The Radio Shack or the Yamaha?

Cheers.

Tom