@jimbennet In your OP, I can not read anything that suggests this information being shared is intended to be adopted by a time-served Vinyl Source enthusiast.
Your OP and other supplied information, is from my view, more than adequate to be used as a guide by somebody with a limited budget and wanting to purchase a first Analogue Source, or to be used as guidance to purchase an Analogue Source as a gift.
Not everybody listening to recorded music, where the Vinyl LP is the Source, is able to have a Cartridge that costs in the high hundreds through to the low thousands. The same goes for not everybody listening to recorded music, where the Vinyl LP is the Source, are being able to listen to their Vinyl Albums using ancillaries that cost tens of thousands.
Budget constraints are nothing new when investing in a Hobby which is fundamentally a choice for being entertained. No different to choosing to see a Movie at a state-of-the-art Cinema with a restaurant booking made to extend the entertainment period, or alternatively waiting for the Movie to become available to watch on the home entertainment system with a takeout meal. Does one method actually prove itself as the better experience over the other, as a means of being entertained?
Other methods are available to reduce costs, with the ambition to get an upgrade in ancillaries. Commonly, the selected method is to purchase used items. As a recommendation to a novice, let alone a time-served, used items are extremely risky as a means to make a purchase.
Not for some time, but I have had the pleasure to sit in Record Stores which are successful in generating plenty of sales of vinyl albums. Coffee and Cake produced by the store is a sideline attraction, which, when indulging, does enable observations of Customers and engaging in conversation. I am very confident in my stating most customers of the age group witnessed are not at a time in life where their disposable incomes allow for anything but budget purchases.
Opening up a forum dialogue that covers the choices available in these lower-end budgets, indirectly, is the seed planting for new aspiring enthusiasts to hang around and take their hobby to new plateaus of improvement, as funds and experiences allow high-end to be considered
