I've never owned a Linn, although I do own an Ariston RD110SL, it's near cousin with a Linn LV-X basic arm. Just had a look at secondhand LP12 prices and my goodness how they have soared! When I last looked a mid 80's Valhalla deck was £350 and an Ittock about the same. Now those prices have doubled.
I have heard many LP12's and for me the Ittock/LP12 is the classic combo. The Ittock looks absolutely fantastic on that deck, better I think than an EKOS and certainly better than any other option although I can't comment on the sound other than to say that LP12/Ittock combo impressed me many times when I heard it back in the day. It was the stuff of dreams to me back then as an avid reader of Hi-Fi Review in my late teens with just a student bar job to fund my music obsession!
In the event I went the Gyro route but I'd quite like a Linn as a second deck, just can't spare the cash. A friend who has owned his LP12/Akito for 20+ years recently went the other way and added a GyroDec to his stable.
What saddens me is that new Linn prices seem to have soared far above any notional inflation rate in recent years - £2k for an Akito which launched at £149.99 and was the replacement for the Linn Basik LV-X which sold for £129.99 back in the day, or the Ekos at nearly 5 grand - it was around £850 at launch. There's a whole generation of emerging vinyl lovers for whom this turntable has become an even more distant dream than it was back in my day. Certainly new Michell turntable and arm prices seem a whole lot more reasonable than Linn nowadays as you can still just about put a Gyrodec/Rega RB330 combo together for £2k and you'll have the latest springs, upgraded bearing etc for that rather than having a load of further expensive upgrades to climb to get to the top spec Linn suspension/sub-chassis. £10k buys you a GyroDec equipped with the best arm (SME IV or V) and their most refined power supply whereas you're looking at closer to £20k for the top spec Linn.
Hi-fi has always been potentially an expensive hobby but for it to survive it's going to need to attract people like my daughter (aged 17) in and I'm not sure jacking prices so that only oligarchs can afford the stuff is the way to go in the longer term. Fortunately companies like Michell, Rega, Cambridge Audio, Project, Arcam, Mission and Quad still believe in selling high performance audio that is good value.
Birdseed