Phoenix Engineering Falcon and Eagle

Roadrunner was $234, now $400
Falcon was $379, now $500.

Although the Falcon is "specified" for motors of 5 Watts or less it can actually run larger motors if properly heat-sinked. Do a Google search.

Whether they still remain reasonable purchases as compared to the competition (and there is none for the Roadrunner and especially the combo*) is for each one to determine for themselves.

No connections, just a very satisfied owner of the Eagle-RR combo with a VPI TT.

*VPI is said to be working on a unit that will combine speed control and speed monitoring.  No ETA or pricing as of yet.

I think it depends upon what one thinks is necessary.  Before the Roadrunner few people monitored TT speed carefully over periods of time.  If nothing else, belts wear out or stretch.  Then there is a bit of disagreement as to whether absolute speed accuracy is important.  But I think there is consensus on the effects of table warm-up, for example.  I recall HW writing not to do serious listening until the table has been going for 30 minutes or so for the reason that, unmonitored, the turntable will not reach its long-term speed setting for a while.  Then there's stylus drag; don't know how great an issue..

FWIW I don't think the variostat will address inconsistencies in the power line frequency.

For me the best thing about this "monitoring and correction" is that is just one more thing I never have to think about.  As the man said, "Just set it and forget it."  So I can obsess about everything else.

"Roadrunner was $234, now $400
Falcon was $379, now $500."

These current prices are via ebay.  The same seller on Amazon is charging $300 for the Roadrunner.  The Falcon is unavailable there.