Budget is undecided.
Currently I have a Stanton T.92 USB which for the most part is fine but what it is lacking is the cuing arm feature that I used to have on a Yamaha table a long time ago.
I liked that the Yamaha was a direct drive as anything with belts can become problematic over time.
Belts can be problematic if the manufacturer goes out of business and you can't get new ones of commensurate quality. Other than that, belts have never been an issue for me, but then I've always replaced them at the interval indicated by the maker. This has varied for me from one year to five years, but the overall price has been about the same since the one-year belt (Audio Technica) was about 1/5 the price of the belts that were supposed to last 5 years (Linn, Rega). U-Turn says, "Under normal use, the belt should last 1000+ playing hours before needing to be replaced." At my level of use, 1000 hours would get me through about 16 months. A new U-turn belt is $10; for comparison, the replacement belt for a Rega Planar 2, while longer lasting, is $55.
I have very little experience with direct drive turntables, mine having been inexpensive models serving as 2nd turntables in systems where my belt drove 'tables made playing 45's and 78's inconvenient or impossible (e.g., Linn, Rega, Well Tempered). I enjoyed both a Stanton STR8-80 and an Audio Technica LP120XUSB as occasional-use turntables, but I don't believe either of them would be described as "something nicer," as you put it in your first post.
I had left all my gear behind in a move across the country a few years ago, but I did buy another LP120XUSB last Christmas when it was on sale for $249 (current price is $449). It's not that I'm not enjoying it, but for full-time use it does have some off-putting niggles, such as an anti-skate control that is far from well calibrated (way too strong; my current one needs the dial to be set at about 1/4 of the vtf number, and it's a bit fiddly to set exactly how I want it). With the supplied cartridge, the arm is tail-up when playing a record, so a headshell spacer would be needed to correct that if desired. The cue lever on both of mine soon lost any damping of the downward movement of the arm; I still use it, but if I want the arm to settle slowly on the record, I need to move the cue lever slowly to make that happen. Trifling matters perhaps, especially at the price I paid, and I do think it's a good-sounding turntable, but the hands-on feel might be disappointing.
Not that I've used one, but I have read good things about the AT-LP5X ($649). Another highly praised option is the Pioneer PLX-1000 ($889), though every review I've seen has commented on the need to adjust loose tonearm bearings. The AT's tonearm bearings have been praised by the reviews I've seen, such as, "I found no perceptible play in my factory-fresh example. It floats smoothly, swinging freely in all directions and appears to be of excellent quality given the modest cost of the turntable as a whole." Technics has a new, lower-price model in the $899.99 SL-50C.
What Hi-Fi is a review source I've learned to trust because my assessment of gear that I've had a chance to audition typically matches theirs. Of the LP5X they wrote, "The AT-LP5x is a well-executed design that sounds great for the money. It’s also well built, easy to set up and nice to use. These things make it worthy of a spot on anyone’s shortlist." If a built-in phono stage is of use to you, the one in the LP5X got this praise from the What Hi-Fi review, "For fun, we bypass the LP5x’s internal phono stage with our reference
Cyrus Phono Signature and take a listen. Despite the price difference (the Cyrus costs £1495) the comparison shows that the Audio-Technica’s phono stage is a good one. We don’t think it will be a limiting factor when the time comes to upgrade."
