LP's... Do they sound better now than 30 yrs ago?

Buying used turntable is a gamble and turntables don't like shiipping, as if anything did, right.
I think, $600 $800 buy something acceptable to begin with, new, not including phono stage and cleaning devices. Dirty vinyl ruines the experience.

Agreed, dirty vinyl does ruin the experience. That and when the previous owner played the records with a nail.

Get a good cartridge, always listen to used vinyl before you buy it, and get a good TT.

There are plenty of good options in the 500-700 range.
I would rather see you buy a $500 TT and a $300 cartridge than a $700 TT with a $100 cartridge.

MusicDirect has a few great OpenBox options, some even with cartridges.

• Rega P2 $675 (No Cart)
  
• MusicHall 2.3 $500 (No Cart)
  
• VPI Cliffwood $900 (w/ Grado Green)
  

What does the rest of your system look like in terms of equipment? Will you need a phono pre-amp?

LP's... Do they sound better now than 30 yrs ago?

No

My experience is many of my older recordings (30 yrs, or older) sound very good and most are very quiet noise wise. Condition of those older pressings is critical though. I have bought newer audiophile records and have had somewhat of a mixed bag of results. The one thing they all had in common was a high price tag. To the OP.  I have said this before. If you buy a  $300 turntable, tonearm, cartridge combo, and a $125 phono stage, and expect analog bliss, you are going to be sorely disappointed. If you're serious about analog playback, put as much money into it as you can afford and make sure to do your research! It takes a lot of effort to put together a quality combination on a strict budget.
Cheers,
Tim 

There are so many variables with vinyl production it's almost impossible to say old is better than new or one is better than the other.  When vinyl was still current I recall returning albums that were simply bad pressings.  Bad pressings can happen anywhere at any time.  I returned a warped brand new Parlorphone album recently.

That said if you have an original pressing of a classic album that was made from a fresh stamper you'll have a good album.  If you got one at the tail end of the stamper's life don't expect it to be as good.  Same goes for the new pressings.  All one needs to do is to take a tour of any new pressing plant or watch a video of same and you'll see nothing has changed.  The question of one being better than the other is perhaps a matter of different. From what I've been able to sample the new pressings sound fine.  Certainly a new pressing of just about anything is going to sound better than a pressing that's been played 10,000 times regardless of what it was played on.