Back to more general question, especially after getting some bad news on my Dual 606 regarding cartridge/stylus upgrade.
Anyway, I've been looking at some more listings out on the old Web, I see some of the more revered turntables, aside from being old(!), seem to feature manual operation. I'm assuming that anyone that owns one of these manually-operated units/decks can't fall asleep, or be otherwise occupied, while a record is playing, or you risk ruining the stylus at the end of a side? I'm also assuming that two reasons that manual is better is because there are fewer noise-inducing parts, as opposed to the "semi-automatic" and "automatic" decks, and more emphasis was placed on the more important parts of the deck, such as the motor and bearings, tone-arm suspension mechanisms, platter isolation, etc.
Manual tables are slightly less complicated than semi-automatic designs but not so much that the lack of a few pieces of metal add substabtially to the cost of the table. The problem with any automatic mechanism is they are connected to the tonearm. As the tonearm tracks the disc, it has to drag the automatic mechanism along with it. This adds friction and resonances to the arm.
There was, and probably still is, a lift kit that fits on manual tables and was just a Rube Goldberg style cantilever system that the tonearm tripped as it moved into the lead out groove. It didn't really have a lot of fans once people saw their expensive cartridge/stylus flying through the air with no controls to keep it from slamming into the LP surface should the trip mechanism fail.
Unless the LP has an off center label there should be no problem with the stylus riding in the silent groove. It can be annoying but the amount of wear on the stylus is negligible.