I bought my 969 second hand and when we arrived to collect it it was upstairs on a mezzazine floor! It was safely lifted down with a fork lift and once on a level surface was easy enough to move with pallet trucks.
Regarding the compressor, we run a 200 litre, noisy Clarke compressor- Deals with the saw and a 299mxsl underpinner with ease and doesn't seem to be overworked at all. This compressor is about £750.00 new but I picked up a year old one on ebay for about half that.
The 969 with smart stop is an amazing bit of kit- We produce over 200 frames a week with a mix of bespoke and repeat sizes and the smart stop, although costing as much as the saw, in my opionion is money very well spent.
These saws do create a lot of dust though so i wouldn't skimp on extraction- I was lucky enough to get hold of a second hand Hippo Dust Box which is a good extractor and just about copes!
Regarding phase converters- I have just moved our spray booth to another part of the building which doesn't have 3 phase.After some research i found the best piece of kit was a digital phase converter from
http://www.drivesdirect.co.uk The owner is most helpful, a quick phone call from our electrician made the installation quick and easy.