best turntable under $5k

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Pedrillo,
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The Turntables from Teres are an incredible value. The best value point might of the line might be the model 320 that sells for % 5,600.00. It would be worth the stretch of $600.00 over your $ 5,000.00 limit (if that is your budget for the table alone).
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Here is the link to the Teres home page:

http://www.teresaudio.com/tables.html
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The Teres TT's are incredibly simple and reliable tables, one of the best motors on the market and perhaps the best sound for the price out there.
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Rgds,
Larry
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Avid Volvere with Rega arm (if you can go 800 higher SME 309. Great tt. Easy to set-up, extremely well made. Dynamics, timing and detail of a non-suspended tt but midrange with depth and palpability of a suspended. Background quietness not unlike cd.

Best under $5k that I've heard is the Galibier Ascent Alu. The mid-range Teres tables tend to smear the image and lose impact on the leading edge of transients. The 360 is better but it's twice what you want to spend.

With a PVC platter the Galibier is $4500, or $5500 with the teflon/alu platter. However if you ask for a discount you will probably get within your budget. It comes with mountings for two arms as standard.

It has the same bearing technology as the Teres because its designer/builder was in that project from the start. It has a simpler and therefore more reliable motor controller circuit and it sounds better.

More at http://www.galibierdesign.com

And unlike most of the guys here who recommend Teres I've actually heard both!

Having said that, both Teres and Galibier offer way better value for money than the longer established brands. Take a look at the materials and work that go into these to appreciate how selling direct enables them to make such great tables so competitively priced.

Another turntable you may want to consider is the progressive (http://www.progressive-engineering.com) I had been looking in the $4000 range and the folks one the Bottlehead forum steered me towards Progressive.

The TT is very well built and easily beats all production tables that I have heard at dealers by a very wide margin. It also allows the use of three arms, which was not a requirement for me, but is proving to be a very enjoyable feature. And it doesn't look all that bad either!!

The proprietor (Mike Paschetto) is very helpful and response unlike some of the other builders I tried to deal with. The turntable was shipped promptly and Mike turns out arm boards with very little notice.

Regards
Paul

I heard the Galibier a couple weeks ago in their listening room. It was the $5500 model with a Shroeder Reference tonearm and a ZYX cartridge (not sure of the model). The phono stage was a Hagerman Trumpet that we rotated a few step-up transformers through. My reason for being there was to audition the Hagerman, which I ultimately bought, but Thom has done a great job on the design and workmanship of the TT.

My recommendation of the SOTA Nova was based on trying to attain a TT/tonearm package in Pedrillo's budget. If $5k is a budget for TT only then I would also recommend the Galibier. It is worth more than that in my opinion and sounds fantastic. Remember though, it is the complete package that makes this happen and I have to estimate all told there was probably $10k or more wrapped up in the analog set-up alone.