You may be able to find a used Jay's in that price range or a little above. Depending on condition, you should be able to get them for $1400 to $1800 with the MK3 upgrade. But you will need to wait.
The Cyrus transport is wonderful assuming your CD collection is in pristine condition. It has minimal error correction which makes it sound stunningly good, but if the disk is not perfect or too thin, it will not work.