Sota Cosmos

@enobenetto My OL arm is the Enterprise MK 5 (latest version that came out Feb 25).  I do not have experience with the whole OL line, so maybe someone can provide input on the upgrade path.  You may also contact Sota, as they sell OL arms, as well, and would be a great source.

Also, the previously mentioned Sota Onyx I listened to was actually using an OL Silver arm.  Says something about their faith in it to put on on a $28K table with a $14K cartridge...

No experience here with SME tables or arms.

The plinths are indeed solid wood with finger joints and the top is veneered (phenolic-resin, I believe).  They do a beautiful job and one of the (many) reasons I was drawn to the table...mine is African Rosewood (Bubinga).  I made a matching Maple/Bubinga base for the table to elevate is a bit (hiding the spike feet and allowing a path for my preferred tonearm cable).  The motor covers are solid wood.

I have only tried my Silver mk4 on my Nottingham Interspace and it sounded great. I use to be a big Unipivot fan, but over the year I've had gimbal tonearms that are great and very high resolution. 

I went to my storage the other day to grab some audio gear that I want to downsize. I was going to grab the SOTA but I didn't have foam inserts for the feet or platter. I finally have the transport bolts but I wanted to have everything packed well; this table makes me nervous more than others about transporting.

If I wanted to replicate the plinth, I don't think it matters too much about the material  for the top, as it offers no support for the rest of the turntable, it's more of a cover, correct?

@enobenetto IMHO, you want to speak to Christan directly to confirm the specific options for you table. One detail I didn't see mentioned in responses, is the changes made between Series V and VI. They were pretty major, and V and older were not upgradeable to VI and later. This was conveyed to me by Donna, the prior owner, just ahead of the launch of VI in late 2017 / early 2018. I was close to buying a brand new V and decided to wait for VI to ensure a future upgrade path.  

Depending on the specifics of your table, adding Condor & RoadRunner could come in different formats. Unlike many I see, my Nova VI with mag lev and vacuum has Condor hidden beneath the arm board cover while the Road Runner is external. Originally the table had black plastic buttons functioning like @mulveling described. At no cost Christan replaced the board with updated firmware and 3 silver "coin" buttons which work flawlessly. Self-install was simple, even for klutzy me. 

Tangentially, I previously owned a very tweaked out SP10MkII. While also a great table with some work, I'd say the Sotas at the level you're talking are set-it-and-forget-it reliable. An SP10 could be eventually, but you will need to mess with isolation, platter tweaks, mat tweaks, weight/clamp tweaks and so on. Very rewarding if you like to experiment and have the funds to indulge. But if you want get close to amazing without having to mess around a bunch...Sota upgrade makes great sense. I'd have kept both if possible. :-).  
Cheers,

Spencer

I am quite content with the Agile on my Cosmos Eclipse. It is a lovely arm in all rights, and I wondered what it would take to outpace my SOTA. In the end I did the math and evaluated what the SOTA brought to the party, and decided the Agile purchase was my best bang for the buck for what I want to spend on analog. 

With that being said, if I were to look at an arm that is less expensive than say the OL Enterprise....I would not hesitate to recommend the latest generation of Audiomods Series 6 Evolution tonearms. In several ways, the build concept is similar to the better OL arms. Not the dual pibot for the vertical bearing assembly but a very nice implementation of a gimbal bearing design. I had the previous generation arm on my Cosmos for awhile as an experiment, and to be honest, I liked it better than my earlier generation SME V. It killed me to think that because a V was my dream arm from my youth. The switch from the SME V to the Agile was one of the better decisions I have made, and never have regretted it.