Phono cable idea's

Hovland MusicGRoove2 works for me. Try the Cable Company, they will let you try one as well as a number of others from their lending library. Within that budget was my purchase, was willing to go higher but nothing they had at at least 2x the cost or more offered much more, didn't try 3.

Do you mean phono cable between your arm and ASR? Any Interconnects will work from your ASR to your preamp (ref3). No need to get a phono cable there.

Best to try some from monoprice. Quality is great, cost low. I've compare them to cables that cost $500 a meter and they sound better, at least in my system. In any event, find a dealer that will give you loaner's. That way you can try a few differenct brands and see which works best for you. Monoprice gladly accepts returns for refund of payment with no re-stocking fees. Find others that will do the same.

Van den Hul the First Ultimate. Very close to the absolute best and still in your price range. My whole system is wired with it.

I have a wonderful cable that I putchased a while back that has been the single best addition to my system I have done in a while. I replaced 4 cables with these and I promise you they wont get disconnected again. The individual that engineered these prefers to stay anonymous for some reason. That was the only "downside" to buying. I have permission to release his contact info to only those who are really interested. It sounds kind of silly, but I am respectful of his wishes. I can say this much, the cables replaced approximately 6000 dollars worth of cables which included Nordost, Kimber and Virtual Dynamics. I sold those and made a profit when I subtracted the price of the new ones.