RP3 with expensive cartridge or stock RP6?

Hbuus wrote: ......"Designed using the latest 3D CAD & CAM technology, the new RB330 is the culmination of more than 35 years of tonearm design experience.  Featuring a brand new bearing housing, and our latest tonearm tube designed using intelligent redistribution of mass ensure this arm will exhibit fewer points of possible resonance. Extreme stability with almost friction free movement from the new high precision bearing assemblies guarantees to gather more information from your vinyl than ever before.      Featuring a new bias assembly, re-designed stiffer vertical bearing housing, integrated      arm clip and an improved spring housing with easier to read numbers.      Rega made, new low capacitance phono cable with Neutrik plugs,      Improved lower friction, precision horizontal and vertical bearings      New design 100g mild steel balance weight." I wonder how it compares to RB303. EDIT: And to Audiomods Classic II

I went to my dealer yesterday and listened to a stock P3 vs. RP8/Apheta 2 on various phono stages (though no Graham Slee, obviously). To my own surprise I preferred the P3 of the two! RP8 sounded too "perfect" for my taste, while the P3 had a more rough, wild, rock'n'roll sound if you like.

Getting just a stock P3 w/Elys 2 cartridge and then enjoy that for as long as possible, then get TT PSU, then enjoy that upgrade, then perhaps get the Exact cartridge and again, enjoy that - this seems like an attractive route to me. But if I do go that route, in the long run I will be paying almost exactly the price of the RP6 with it's better base/foundation, yet only have the P3. Like I said, I would however have had the joy of upgrading various parts instead of getting it all at once with the RP6.

Another option would be to get the stock P3, don't upgrade it at all, use that for a year or so, then buy a RP8 with a cartridge better matching my taste than the Apheta 2. I've been told on a Danish forum that I most likely would have preferred the RP8 had I heard it with another cartridge, for example Rega's Exact, which apparently should have a sound similar to P3's Elys 2.

Btw. my dealer thinks the RP6'es produced now will have the RB330 arm, he'll investigate it for me.

I'd really like to get a TT now, so waiting X months for Rega to, perhaps, introduce a new RP6...I'd hate that!

I _could_ get the RP8 with an Exact now, but it's a £911 higher total price than the stock RP6.
That's a lot of money!!

Hehe

Audio Affair UK applies 10% discount today on i.e. Graham Slee phono stages, so I have taken a chance and ordered a Reflex M with balanced outputs and green PSU.

(It's probably non-returnable because of AA's return policy, as I selected XLR-outputs = it may become a specialized item and thus non-resellable. But I'm pretty sure I'll love it - otherwise I wouldn't have ordered it.)