Which TT the Pro-Ject RM-5 SE or Rega P3-24?

75% of the vinyl I have purchased has been damaged (remember I have zero
tolerance for clicks and pops). Cleaning did not ameliorate the damage. I use
AIVS.

Last year I was lucky to buy a mint condition LP; one of the few truly mint LPs
I have found. During the cleaning process, I accidentally dropped the
threaded brass screw top of my steam cleaner on the record, creating a nice
little divot. Damn.

Learsfool, perhaps you will share with us your excellent sources for good
vinyl, since you have success finding it.

Thanks in advance.

Well, as far as sources go, everything I have bought on audiogon has arrived in fantastic condition, though admittedly I haven't bought much here yet. I have apparently had much better luck on ebay than many posters here seem to have, I have almost never had any problems shopping there. There is also a chain in my area called Half Price Books that sells used records. There are several branches near me, and I look for vinyl at a few of them regularly. Just today, I picked up a near-mint condition copy of the opera Peter Grimes on the London label, conducted by Britten himself with Peter Pears singing Peter for only 8 bucks. I have seen it go on ebay for 10 times that. Alot of people seem to have good luck in thrift stores and estate sales as well, but I have yet to explore these options, I have only been collecting vinyl again in the last several months. I have also been fortunate to have a few friends who gave me their collections of vinyl that they were not using anymore. There are many people doing this now that they can transfer their vinyl recordings to their computers.

Sometimes you will have a click or pop, that is true. Sometimes these can go away with a good cleaning regimen, sometimes not (I personally am a little dubious of steam cleaning, by the way, though I know there are some who swear by it). In my view, that sort of noise is just on the surface. It is not embedded in the music itself. I will put up with a little bit of that to get the larger dynamic range, the more accurate instrumental timbres, and the less musically objectionable distortions of analog over digital, to name just a few benefits. Also, a good arm and cartridge will sometimes track right through a scratch without noise. I have found the fingernail test to be pretty reliable when shopping in the used stores (if you can feel it, you'll hear it, but if you can't, there's a very good chance you won't). Much vinyl out there is not as damaged as it sometimes appears, in my experience.

Thanks Learsfool.

Would mind sharing the E-Bay sellers specifically by their monikers?
It'd be helpful for those of us who shop there.

I am fortunate to own an exceptionally good digital source. In my system, the
differences in sound between digital and analog on equally good recordings
is extremely small, if not completely negligible.