Another turntable

When it comes to looking at Direct Drive TT's,  from the Vintage Brands and Models, a Denon DP - 80 can be found for well under the $2000 allocation of Budget. Shipping and Import will be additional to the Purchase. Overseas shipping has recently had price increases, but for a single TT, these may up $70-100 to the prior to Covid charges.

I suggest the DP-80 for two reasons, one being that I own Two Models in my collection of a  Selection of Vintage DD TT's from the same production era. 

The other being more of the Ancillaries available and seen often that might just suit your purposes, the DP-80 is commonly seen in two forms that is with oor without a Plinth.

The Plinths seen for the DP-80 are often seen a Models that has the option for Two Arms in built as part of the design. From recollection I know there are Plinth Models that will accommodate one 12" Tonearm but I can't reassure that I have seen a design that will support two 12" Tonearms, I am sure a little though on the matter would produce a satisfactory method to enable the use of two arms at 12".

There was a lot of research carried out by the Big Brands during this TT's Production era and there will be Plinth Materials known off, that are being reported on as a better interface material that other types, it might be worth looking into the preferred material selection, another plus is that Plinths show up for sale as individual Items without the TT as part of the sale. This would enable a TT Motor Unit and Plinth to be selected as individual items and be shipped, if a intermediary buying service is used, this service will receive your goods, and combine the items into one package for shipping. 

The icing on the cake with the DP-80 is that if one is to be sought as a TT, and the buyer has a understanding of the ancillaries it can be supplied with, an extension time of surveying the used item sales market, will allow for a Phosphor Bronze / Gun Metal Plinth Model to appear, surprisingly these do not usually command a large margin of increased asking price.

I will cut of here, and  let other users of this suggested model inform you its credentials as a TT   

Thanks for your answers and opinions.I didn’t think Origin Live could be that good. Interesting.I’m a bit surprised nobody talked about  Verdier or SME nor Brinkmann that are the more often talked about in this price range.
 

A few years ago I was in the same position as you are now. I had a TW Raven GT SE with the AC platter and Black Night battery PSU. This PSU gave me lots of trouble, even after returning it twice to the manufacturer for repair. So I decided to sell it. I know I’ll be at the receiving end of demeaning comments from certain folks here, but I decided to try my luck with an old Micro RX-1500. Even in it’s basic form with aluminum platter the sound was surprisingly good. This made me decide to upgrade the table with stainless steel platter, copper mat, R-15 mass loaded feet and brass outer flywheel ring. I also had the motor drive fully refurbished. There’s plenty of space for up to 4 tonearms. The required gunmetal armboards are fairly easy to find and there are 1 on 1 replicas as well. In this fully dressed up version the RX-1500 runs circles around the TW, no comparison. Very important part of this outcome has been the use the SF-1 Kevlar belt. String drive will be equally good, but don’t use the standard rubber belt.

Of course the Micro can be easily dismissed as ‘old school’ technology, but I haven’t regretted this backward step for a micro second. It has secured itself firmly as my proverbial ‘last table’. And with your budget you can easily stretch to an RX-5000, assuming your rack can handle the weight.

Thanks very much for this answer. I didn’t think these « little » MS were that good. I will investigate further but it seems the majority of these TTs are from Japan or US so have to convert to 230V.

The RX-1500 was sold in fairly large numbers in the EU, so 220V versions are not that rare although prices are steadily on the rise. The RX-5000 is much harder to find in EU voltage. Of the really big air bearing models like SX-8000 mk II only a handful 220V versions were apparently imported. If offered at all, your 20k budget won’t be enough.

Another option might be to check www.micro-seiki.nl or www.db-tribute.nl and look for The Tribute. This is a meticulously built one-on-one replica of the RX-5000 that can be sold together with a newly designed motor drive made by Dereneville in a chassis similar to the RY-5500 motor drive. Should be easily possible within your budget. On this site you will also find some of the add-on accessories, like the copper mat and even a replica of the HS-80 flywheel. The guy who runs this business is great to deal with, a real fanatic when it comes to quality and very customer friendly.

unfortunately my Finite Elemente Pagode HD Wallmount can’t handle the total weight of the Tribute, otherwise this would surely have been my ‘last table’.