Welcome to vinyl!
My advice going forward: All due respect to local retail dealers, I found that the folks on this forum provide me with very experienced advice without the inevitable dealer ulterior motivation of upselling me only the shop's limited products. I say this after many years and many dollars of high price/mediocre performance mainly due to mismatched components, local retail shop influence, and my own stubborness. If I had better followed the suggestions, hints, and gentle nudges in the right direction from this forum (as well as audio asylum), I would have saved quite a bit of time and money.
My advice going forward: All due respect to local retail dealers, I found that the folks on this forum provide me with very experienced advice without the inevitable dealer ulterior motivation of upselling me only the shop's limited products. I say this after many years and many dollars of high price/mediocre performance mainly due to mismatched components, local retail shop influence, and my own stubborness. If I had better followed the suggestions, hints, and gentle nudges in the right direction from this forum (as well as audio asylum), I would have saved quite a bit of time and money.