Turntable - The Next Step

@gnoworyta , Get a cookie jar and keep saving. What you intend on spending is not enough to achieve a significant improvement, one that you would notice. Rough estimate is you would have to save $6000 to do the job right. This is for the turntable, tonearm and cartridge. There are a million ways to break this up and each one of us is going to have a different opinion, a confusing mess. Learn what features improve the performance of a turntable. Watch this video. There is one big mistake in this video. It undercuts the importance of anti skating which no serious audiophile would do without. 

Go one step further with a moving coil and add a SUT. I’m using a Jensen mc2rr-L with a Hana EL into the moving magnet input of my phono preamp in another set up. Sounds fantastic.

Another option for an upgrade to turntable would be to look into an Avid turntable. They are big on the concept of the turntable matters more to the sound than the cartridge used. If you look at a lot of turntables that are of significant cost, you will notice that they provide with the turntable a relatively low cost, but high quality cartridge. For instance, on the Avid Ingenium plug and play, they provide a premounted unbranded moving magnet cartridge, actually a Rega Carbon with no markings. Also look at what comes installed on the high buck Vertere DG-1....its a rebadged Audio-Technica AT-VM520EB, I think 100 bucks. Some will say we'll that's because they don't want to provide a very expensive cartridge with the turntable package, as they assume the end user will just replace it.....I say bull crap....they provide the lower tier cartridge because they listened to the end result and found it to do all things necessary to provide great sound. In other words, don't waste your money buying some high dollar cartridge. 

I own the above mentioned Avid Ingenium plug and play and I can attest that it has an outstanding build quality for the money spent. 

@andyhifiman  which Clearaudio...?

I don’t think you need to spend $6k to get to a much better place. It’s possible you can spend double that and end up with terribly mismatched components. I think you can do it for less than $4k.

But, yes, spending $6k+ can make it less challenging for sure.

So if you do decide to pause to save some money, I would at least, for the time being, get a better MM cart. Your Elyse 2 is an elliptical. It’s a fine cart but you can do better. Try a good micro line or shibata stylus. I can recommend the AT VM740ML or 750SH. If your phono stage can do 100pF capacitance, you’ll really enjoy the added detail and dynamics these stylus profiles can provide.

These carts are the current successors to the famed AT150MLX. What’s great is that you can start with the 740ML (micro line) and replace the stylus with a 750SH (Shibata) when time comes. You can even upgrade to the 760SLC (Super Line Contact) as they all use the same engine/body.

I purchased the Clearaudio Performance DC turntable with a Universal tonearm and am extremely pleased with the outcome.