Hello fishhunter2.
I see this an old thread, but what/who was your fix for the Karik? My tray is starting to drag and not open reliably.
Of course this is happening right when I'm replacing my other old Linn stuff (same era) and only wanted to keep the transport in service. Go figure. Opened it up and cleaned a little here and there, which helped only slightly.
As for the joy of getting a new one. The offerings these days for transport only are less than exciting to me. I want the half rack size of the Karik and also don't want to give up the random access to individual tracks from the remote control that a number of the transport only units offer (Woo Audio, NuPrime which I like otherwise for the money). Also don't want a total entry level unit to go with my new gear.
The Bel Canto seems to fill the bill, but hard to find any recent reviews on it at all. Weird. It's a slot loader too, which I'm not crazy about, and it's too expensive to go with blind at 1700 bucks. May just go with the little Pro Ject for now.
Anyway, any advice on the Karik appreciated.