SOTA Turn Table set up for 5K - more or less?

Hello all!

If you plese, I actually have two questions. Primarily what is the expense for being squarely in the mix with a more than competent TT array for one, and secondly will the vinyl cut of the exact same digital track ALWAYS be received as noticeably better, if all else in the system is ‘virtually’ the same?

IMO, if the second Q is NO. I’d not wish to spend one thin dime on a TT phono setup. Ever. There would be no need.

Only one demand must be addressed in my situation of the TT itself. It should have a tone arm ‘lifter upper’ ‘setter downer’ lever, if possible. These were fairly common uh, decades ago. I’m thinking it will keep me from destroying stylus with regularity. Maybe.

Neither am I into the MM or MC camp so that aspect probably should be touched upon here too if one is more favorable than the other to employ.

I’m aghast at some prices I’m seeing in the turntable market. Enormously expensive cartridges, arms, and of course, the table.

A friend just told me of an audition wherein a TT worth over 100K was in use. Whoa!

I am looking at what it takes these days to handily put digital in the rear view mirror. Albeit, I’d not throw digital out with the bath water, ever. It occurs to me so many state vinyl is the ‘ticket’, some phono setups I’ve heard IMHO simply have not been what I’d call ‘thrilling’ night and day, experiences. Are clicks and pops a thing one eventually gets used to and begins to ignore? Or is that a thing the LP may be introducing to the presentation, and not the phono outfit itself?

Throw on a Phono pre if required or desired, and the necessary or suggested accessories for keeping up and cleaning LPs and merely operating a TT somewhere in the middle ranges of high end audio becomes a whole lot of wow! And some serious frog skins. Between just the ph pre and cleaning box it isn’t hard to have $10K lifted from your account.

With the idea of having a extremely low maintenance TT setup which will undeniably, unquestionably and irrefutably, surpass the presentation of digital, where does one need to land budget wise?

To clarify, in 2017 using not necessarily but possibly, brand new pieces, what must a person spend to be well into the vinyl groove?

I should think, for this accounting, include a phono preamp, table, cartridge, arm, bare minimum tools, and good to very good maintainence equipment for cleaning and preserving the records.

Platforms and cables, would be arbitrary items chosen from user preffs and or seen as optional, eg., bases, and need not be included.

Is $5K more than enough, far too little, or is it an ‘are you kidding?” fact for amassing a very very nice, exceptionally adept phono system?

Or, is $5K plenty or more than enough for a functioning TT, but the rabbit hole doesn’t end there! If one is truly serious? Media not with standing.

Thanks for the insights.