A friend that owns the Yamaha RXV-2500 had very favorable things to say about its phono stage-he is running a Thorens TD125 Mk II, SME 3009 II arm and an Audio Technica cartridge (don't recall the exact model). I would guess that the RXV-2600 has the same or very similar phono stage. As for your options, the NAD does not appear to have a built-in phono stage (I reviewed the manual at the NAD site and could not find one referenced), and the Denon and Yamaha will only have enough gain for moving magnet cartridges-if you have a moving coil cartridge, you will need an outboard phono preamp or a step-up transformer. Apologies in advance if you already had this background info. Happy hunting!