Polabear119,
I used the JRDG phono card for a while but found it flat for my tastes, that's not saying much. I switched to the Musical Phenonena with battery pack and found it gave me a much warmer and smoother sound because of the many gain and impeadence setting you can work with. I have a Nottingham Innerspace with Innerspace arm and Dynavector 20x5 cartarage. I'm real happy now. Vinyl ROCKS...
You're right about speaker choices....amen brother...I first heard the Concentra with Audio Physics Spark III's and was totally blown away, but when I got them home I quickly realized I was listening to that set up in a $30,000+ room, and I aint never gonna be there... so to speak!
I then walked into a shop that had just got the special 25's right after they were released, I was blown away, I checked out a few other brands around town, Reference 3a, Vandersteen, Totem, Thiel, B&W, Rega, Naim and Magnapan all very fine speakers and all very musical in their own right. Nothing could satisfy me like the Dyns however...so I've had them for over a year and, no fatigue, no brightness, no strain to listen to and talk about warm, Dave Lennox could do so good with his new line of furnaces. :) I especially love the air between the instrument when playng Jazz, and trio music. If you can get a copy of Joe Pass's "Joy Spring" jump on it, great music to listen to in the first place, as well as to get a feeling of space between the players. Don't even get me started on female volcals...YUM YUM!
The Dyns have a slightly forward mid-range but I only notice that when friends bring over their speakers to play compare the A/B with.