[kbuzz3]

1) pilot 216a vintage preamp.  Beautiful looking and great sounding. 
2) 8 dollar gel gems on all my windows. It may be placebo but my bright room has sucked for years until i tried this tweak-it cant be coincidence

[James Romeyn]

For me (and I speak only for me), belt-driven vinyl was as un-satisfying as digital was.  I'm sure there are exceptions to the rule, but without concise (generally outboard) speed control with belt drivers they sound unnatural, in different ways (wow and flutter, pitch, speed stability) than CD does.  Without speed regulation, to my ears, vinyl is barely better sounding than cassette tape    So, I cannot really endorse dusting off your old Well Tempered...unless it's one of the upmarket models with speed controllers.

Most every direct drive unit of the past 30 years have been quartz servo locked and get things as precise as analog will allow on the playback side.  It wasn't until I discovered direct drive did the magic of (sanely priced) vinyl make it back to me 

We all hear different things in our music, so don't let me be the solitary guide for this.  But, I think if you buy one of hundreds of good Japanese tables made in the past 30 years and sold on ebay for a pittance.....you're gonna' find vinyl magic within and understand what I mean.

John

Ditto.  Strange, and true.   

[orthobiz]

For me (and I speak only for me), belt-driven vinyl was as un-satisfying as digital was. 
John

Ditto.  Strange, and true.   

The most recent upgrade to my LP12 Linn was the newer Lingo. My original table without mods and the old Lingo still had wow and flutter, now I think eliminated, but at more than the cost of one of the direct drive units! Anyway, I'm happy for now.

My torture test is a funny warped record, Chester & Lester (guitar with Les Paul and Chet Atkins, great stuff) which was super sensitive to the W&F issue. The warp is over a tiny radial band on the record and really affected the sound with every other iteration of the turntable. Now it's gone, thank goodness!

Paul

[dangerbird]

A SinglepowerPPX 3 headphone amplifier, IIRC about 400.00