Yes it's a kit. It seems you assemble the bearing and skeleton plinth and it has a seperate motor pod. Then you pick out your own arm they say they drill the armboard for a Rega 250 or Moerch you get two seperate armboards with the kit. With a Moerch it looks like a great deal but it is still around 2k all together. Some say the Shure type 5 sounds very good on the unipivot. You cannot beat the Shure. Even the m97e is a good cartridge for 90$ in my opinion. You know I think these big companies can afford the R&D and volumne pricing that the small guys have a hard time competing with in something like a phono cart. The other thing is the shure has been around how long and it is still competitive; where are the advancements in audio? I still use a type 3 occasionally and I could live with it easily with no regrets. Good tweak; crazy glue the body of the stylus of your M97 to the cartridge body and laugh when you hear how good it sounds and how well it tracks.