Agree Brendan get the Vertere phono 1 and it will be a good match for your TT
No mucking around, wise move
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Get the Vertere. Highly recommended.
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Went vinyl several years ago…started with a Rega, then a Majik LP12…then upgraded and upgraded, second hand Urika and Ekos tonarm, Kandid cart. So now it’s right below Kilmax level .
I buy a few albums a week, now have over 700. BlueNote reissues are excellent modern releases, I have about 500 albums form the 70’s that sound superb.
I have an NDX2 that I like a lot, but it’s not in the same league as the LP12. Even basic from the dollar bins album (as long as it’s clean) sounds better than digital, even Hi res, and I have thousands of albums on digital.
My wife and son have no interest in my music so it’s purely a labor of love. Someone will inherit a great system and collection when I’m gone though!
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Same path as I’ve taken Spacin007 - gone a bit further with 2 fully loaded LP12’s - some say nuts
Like you I have the NDX 2 with XPS 2
I like it and I still use the CD5XS as transport into ndx2 dac
Probably use vinyl 50% of time and the 0ther 2 25% each
Vinyl still my go to
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IMO the best quality of sound will come from a FLAC file through a decent streamer and good kit
Does not matter how much you spend on a turntable and components,
Halve the fun of vinyl is the collecting bit
Hunting for that rare record,
finding that original recording,
I love it, 
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My daughter loves vinyl, she is always going through mine,
We even go trolling the record shops together,
I’ve had to place small coloured stickers on mine,
Red never to be played it’s expensive and rare,
Yellow only if you really have too but I rather you didn’t,
No sticker go for it,
This is good advice! 
I don’t dispute that most recent recordings are digital - my point was that the original digital recording goes through a specific production process - including mastering - to produce a vinyl LP, so it’s not directly copied. There is a parallel and different process involved in making a CD from the same recording. No doubt some vinyl is sourced from CD rather than from the original digital master but that is usually only in the case of dubious companies who are not licensing from the original owners of the recording and exploiting grey areas of copyright law.
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I was in a similar position 10 years ago except that I still had about 600 records with nothing to play them on. I dipped a toe in the water with a P3 to see how it worked out.
For me I ended up with a high spec LP12. My digital source then was a CDS3. I still prefer vinyl but the convenience of the NDX2 wins out much of the time.
Recommend a RCM if you get into it.
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…but, I would say that, generally, you do not need special pressings to realise the wow factor associated with vinyl replay.
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I couldn’t disagree anymore.
I have one of the very gest digital rigs you can buy, i also have a very nice turntable set up.
They are both fantastic, but the vinyl has something that my digital just can’t do.
If you have never heard vinyl done right then you are certainly missing out.
I can give you lot’s of albums that sound better on vinyl than digital. But i guess the biggest stand out one is
Thelma Houston & Pressure cooker, I’ve Got The Music In Me. This is a direct cut record from back in the day way before digital. This means as they performed it live, a master record cutting machine cut the vinyl disc that is then used to press the rest.
This album sounds so dynamic, live and just wonderful, the same digital version sounds the complete opposite, god knows how they managed to go from something so great to something so poor.
But if you have never heard it, certainly go find it on vinyl, and do not be put off by the digital version as it’s so bad.
So i guess as always it’s the quality thats been applied to how it’s been done that counts, where that’s digital or vinyl. But these day’s they do tend to produce far more rubbish than quality, plus most stuff is aimed at the younger headphone listener that dont care about quality as they aren’t going to hear it anyway on what they are playing it on.
But i would say you can get better quality music cheaper going vinyl than digital.
That gap has come down more recently as very good sounding dac’s are available at much cheaper prices than before, but even so good vinyl still has that extra something to it.
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I see clive what you are saying, and it’s basically what i was trying to say.
But you will find it very hard to buy any new vinyl that hasn’t at some point gone through some sort of digital path.
You need the old stuff for that before digital was about. When it was all an analogue path.
To me, these sound far better, as the dynamics dont get squeezed down, and you get far more volume differences in the music, as you would if listening live to it.
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Convenience is a major factor and certainly something to consider.
It’s much harder to just get lost in the music if you have to keep getting up and changing vinyl
This is an important point: even the simplest TTs need correct setting up (level, cartridge set up, support)…I’ve done this since the early 1980s, and it seems straightforwards to me. And then, like many others, I think that digital just does not get close to vinyl for enjoyment. I do have an excellent digital pathway, and I do enjoy its music…but, it’s pretty obviously not as good as vinyl if I listen to vinyl first.
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Yes turntable set up is massively important obviously, that’s why i recommended the rega, as it’s fool proof. Plus no messing going forward to worry about
Plus i feel the rega P8 is the sweet spot in the range, for valve, sound quality, etc.
For someone just entering this journey it’s a fantastic place to start from, and could well set you up for ever as it’s certainly good enough for that.
Yes you could start at a P1 or even P3, but i think that most on hear appreciate what sounds nice, and i think you could soon be asking questions of the lower rega decks, but probably not the P8.
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Thanks all. Like I said it’s just thoughts at this stage. A good friend of mine sells vinyl from home and he has over 10,000 LP’s mainly acquired from house clearances and the like. He listens on a Technics 1210 and a 1970’s Marantz amp in a small room which should have terrible acoustics, and it sounds incredible. So he would be my main source of vinyl.
Like I said it’s just thoughts at this stage. I am drawn to the simplicity of the P8. Only thing that puts me off slightly is the design which is very stylish in its own right but I prefer the traditional boxy look. Not a biggie though. Where to locate it and a phono stage is a bigger hurdle.
That might be so, Jim, but look at the difference between your sources!
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@Stu299 coming into this thread late, IMO a very nice deck would work really well with you system, but IMO you would need to spend a reasonable amount to get full value out of your 552/500/606
I would get to a dealer who can show you and demo decks with 552/500
my journsey started some 20+ years ago and I always wanted to have vinyl as 1 source, started out with CD and now Digital
my decks started with Rega 1 and then 3 and then the rabbit whole of LP12 - does that mean you need to keep spending no, but balance your source to your system to be honest, fortunatly @Cymbiosis have always done this for me and I made the decision after my CD2/XPS2 days, I went LP12 and built the deck over the years to where it is now (system in my Bio)
on vinyl quality some of the finest musuical albums I own are from MoFI, Abbey Road, Rhino to name as few , but played Black yesterday £12 from my vinyl dealer and it sounded superb
enjoy the journey !
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I don’t think my second hand LP12, from a well known dealer, does not match the sound of my NDS. I hardly play my vinyl, which I had collected nearly forty years ago.
The above is hard for me to say as I was a late adopter of digital, thinking my ears only hear analogue. I bought the LP12 because I did not want to throw 500 records away, but digital is so convenient.
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I’m still grappling with my own internal discussion on this very subject. I think the thing that keeps tripping me up in my thoughts is that the funds that I might spend on a turntable could be spent on improving the streaming side. Why have 2 very good sources when you could have one brilliant.
I’ll probably still do it though 
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