Upgrade Sota Comet or buy a used table?

Your call of course. The VPI would give you a little different flavor and you might prefer it.

SOTA is a great company and I went from a sapphire to a cosmos MKIV and I am done and super satisfied with my vinyl.

The sapphire was a great table and sometimes they come up used at really good price points.

I would think the Aries would be an upgrade to the Comet and depending on how long you have been spinning it might be fun to make a change and try it. I do not know how Comet's go on the used market but I would think the upgrade makes sense from a sale down the road perspective.

Have Fun.

Why don't you just change the arm to a Rega 301 or older RB300? If the table is working then that would be the wise thing to do. I feel the Aries is a superior table to the Comet and offers better isolation, etc.

I would go with the upgrade. The table will easily be worth what you paid for it if you want to sell later. Or how about upgrading to a Sapphire now. I have and do own a number of Sotas and they are well worth the money at each level. My Cosmos IV is the best table I have ever owned or heard.

I had an VPI Aries that I recently got on trade. It sold fast. It is a "NICE" sounding turntable but I preferred my buddy's new Sota Comet to the VPI. More music seemed to be difference. The Sota just had more information. It was clearer smoother and had a much better tonal balance. Oddly enough we used a Sumiko Blackbird as our test cartridge on both tables. Keep in mind that there many differences and that the VPI given a different cartridge and could sound better than the Comet. For the test to be completely fair we would have to have the same tonearm on both tables just like we did with the cartridge.

I think you could do alot better for a little bit more money by moving on to something else. Please don't be insulted, but remember, the Comet is a "starter" table. You alredy bought it once and now you are thinking about throwing $800.00 back into it. Now, you may Love your Comet, but do you really know how much better and even magical sound you can obtain with something else? I would suggest a used Spacedeck, or Well Tempered Classic. They both are "real" tables that could relieve you from the upgrade bug in the future. But thats just me, if you are hot for VPI like everybody else here, then consider that too. I had a Sapphire for years and even after much tweaking and factory upgrades (Sota loves upgrades, hint, hint) it was easily bested by even my humble '70's AR with a homemade arm. I mean it was no comparison. Yes, this move will cost you more than $800.00, but you will be set for a long time unless you eventually decide to spend an insane amount of money on your analog set up.