I don't know the OP's reasoning for a vintage turntable. Is it for the look to go with a vintage rig? Is it to save money? Is it the belief that everything sounded better 30+ years ago? Given that a turntable is a mechanical device, getting an old one guarantees that you'll need it worked over, at least bearing lubrication and in some cases tonearm bearing replacement. On suspended designs it may need new springs and rubber bumpers and grommets that deteriorate over time.
That said, your best bet is probably an '80s direct drive turntable, understanding that it will at least need the bearing lubed with the correct oil.
As the 5-year enthusiastic owner of a Technics SL1210 M5G, I can say that this turntable has smooth operation and long term reliability with a minimum of maintenance, mainly the bearing lubrication. However, out of the box it has great speed accuracy and low noise, but sounds rather murky. Fortunately it can be turned into a very clean, lively and dynamic turntable with a few low cost tweaks:
o Get a real good turntable mat
o Wrap the tonearm with lightweight Teflon pipe thread tape to dampen it
o Get an LPGear ZuPreme (or Sumiko) headshell
o Replace the standard feet with threaded brass cones or Vibracones sitting on Vibrapods
o Set the whole thing on a big thick butcher block cutting board
o Get the tonearm fluid damper from KABUSA.com. Don't overfill the trough.
o Put a nice MM/MI cartridge on it, such as an Audio Technica AT150MLX, Grado Reference Platinum, Goldring 10x2GX series, or Ortofon 2M Blue, Bronze, or Black. Some low output moving coil carts work well on it too, such as the Zu Audio Zu-103, the Audio Technica PV33 and others, or Denon DL-301 series, DL-304, or DL-S1.
This summaraizes what I did to mine and it takes a pretty expensive turntable to hear a difference. If you do all this you will have a compelling, quiet, dynamic turntable with good frequency extension for a few hundred dollars.
