3k budget for Turntable and Phono Noob- do I need external power supplies?

Got a couple questions for you. 

1. Have you done vinyl before? 

2. Do you have any vinyl now?

3. Do you want to get involved in a fully analog laborious process?

4. Do you have storage/space for records?

5. Have you thought about all the ancillaries, vinyl needs?

6. Do you like to constantly fiddle with things? 

Records are very time consuming, and all manual. Even taking the record out of the sleeve can be a patience sucking maneuver. 

If you go in with eye wide open, enjoy, it's also a lot of fun, and very satisfying. Plus records sound great!!!

That all being said, I have a Pro-Ject X2, works great for me, easy to setup, easy to maintain, sounds great. But it's big, and heavy. Also the stock Suikmo cart sounds wonderful. 

My advice, get a TT that is easy to use, easy to setup, and does not require a lot of maintenance. Use it, learn all the ins and outs. Wait till you destroy a needle to upgrade the cart. With the TT, buy a carbon brush, needle brush, and a basic record cleaning kit. Learn how to use all of it, then start the upgrade path.

Buying records is very addictive. Also they all cost more then you think.  It feels like every trip to the record store is a $300 experience. 

Excellent advice from @vettegood 

And the Vincent 701 has its own external linear power supply.

But to answer your original question, generally speaking you can spend $500 on a SBooster power supply or $75 on the AliExpress version. The difference between the two is that the latter will leave you with $425 to buy LPs with 🙂

Or no aftermarket PS at the outset and have all $500 to buy LPs. 

Don't rush in, get started and ascertain if you will stick with Vinyl before spending real money.

I advise picking a Quartz Locked Direct Drive TT model with a tonearm with removable headshell type. I had one of these for years, a great start IMO

AT120 has optional phono EQ, has AT95 Cartridge Body

You simply upgrade to a different Stylus, no re-alignment needed

Change Stylus to Shibata Shape

Once you find you will stick with it, and begin a collection, learning along the way, you will have a much better ability to sort choices.

you can easily try a better cartridge in it's own headshell, eventually have a small collection, pre-mounted/aligned ready to play.

I did a big upgrade beginning in 2019, during Covid stay home years, a mixture of used, NOS, new, and took a risk on a few used ones, ass well as had a few re-built.

My favorite cartridge is a used one I just bought, price was low enough to risk, got lucky.

Better to start with an advanced stylus shape properly aligned, far more difference in sound than a power supply change.

You don't have to buy Soundsmith, but they have good information

https://www.sound-smith.com/articles/stylus-shape-information

Fluance Belt Drive has a Removable Headshell

It comes bundled with Ortofon Blue 2M, which I do not recommend because it is an elliptical shape on aluminum, good but not exceptional. I’d much rather you got an advanced shape, i.e. MicroLine or Shibata shape, on a stiffer cantilever i.e. boron

The advanced shapes cost more, however they have much larger contact surfaces in the groove, less wear/last longer, and they produce less wear to your LPs simultaneously. If it cost twice as much, last nearly twice as long, tracks lighter, less wear on your lps, that is win/win/win.

the cartridge body’s technology combined with the stylus cantilever suspension and lightness/stiffness of material, advanced stylus shape has to be excellent to produce both wide channel separation and tight channel balance: they combine to far better imaging abilities, always check those two specs, then research reviews about it’s ’sound’.

It does NOT have an optional Phono stage, thus you need to decide/buy a separate one, whereas the AT120 gets you started, you learn and get phono stage when you know more.

I tried IFI, sent it back, I tried Cambridge Duo, sent it back, I liked a $14. unit from Pyle more, used it, kept trying others that were returnable, because it is ’preferred’, not ’better’ when it comes to phono eq.