I will add to the Technics SL-12XX series. For the money they are no brainers. Look you will find most who have had these with an open mind will state they are knockouts to anything you can remotely get in their price point. Add some KAB USA mods and you get a real champ.
I fell into the direct drive being bad cr@p when I got back into vinyl in 2002 and let m tell you the arguments against good direct drive is cr@p. The drive system on the SL-12xx series is excellent and dead silent. I have a KAB USA distributed SL-1200mkII with the Cardas arm rewire and it's a beauty with my Denon DL-110 H.O. moving coil cartridge. I will add the fluid arm damper down the road.
I fell into the direct drive being bad cr@p when I got back into vinyl in 2002 and let m tell you the arguments against good direct drive is cr@p. The drive system on the SL-12xx series is excellent and dead silent. I have a KAB USA distributed SL-1200mkII with the Cardas arm rewire and it's a beauty with my Denon DL-110 H.O. moving coil cartridge. I will add the fluid arm damper down the road.