TT, 12" Tonearm. Who tried and ended up preferring 12" arm?

I'll definitely be testing my existing cartridges in the 7082 arm with the Shure V15 torture LP with resonance test bands, as well as the Victor ZS1 that is already in it.

MICROSCOPE.

Final, repeat, FINAL part of this step up is to get a Microscope to really see Stylus.

What power is enough? Too much is too shallow focus depth I believe.

I see units that clamp on cell phone cameras, ...?

USB to computer?

If you want to see it just like a re-tipper can see it then you need a USB microscope. 

But i'm fine with macro lens for iPhone when i'm taking pictures of my cartridges, here is the one with unused stylus (NOS FR PMC-3) 

Best way to see it is a binocular dissection microscope. You get much better depth of field this way.  

If you have a problem with using a dust cover and it is not just in your head it is because your turntable and/or dust cover are designed incorrectly. In either case you get inferior sound particularly if your turntable is in the room with your system. 
The Dust cover can not be mounted to the platform carrying the platter and/or tonearm. The SOTA Cosmos is an excellent example of a turntable beautifully designed for a dust cover. The dust cover is mounted to the external chassis. The sub chassis is suspended inside with the platter and tonearm mounted to it. The SOTA sounds better with it's dustcover down because all the other sound in the room is attenuated over 20 db. The platter, tonearm and cartridge are better isolated from the environment. With the SME there is no external enclosure to mount a dust cover to so I sit the turntable on a platform to which the dust cover is mounted. The dust cover does not touch the SME.
If you have an unsuspended plinth to which the platter, tone arm and dust cover are mounted the dust cover may transfer some vibration at resonance frequencies to the active parts of the turntable making things sound worse. These tables and designs like the VPIs and Clearaudios need to be set on a platform to which the dust cover is mounted then you will improve the sound with a dust cover and prolong the life of your records, tonearm and cartridge. 
This is obvious and the case unless you hear micro vibrations like lewm.
In which case your system is always going to sound lousy and you might as well give up and play cricket.