This raises interesting questions. Do we monitor in today's world or yesterday's world? For example, when playing back the Crosby tapes, we all loved hearing them on the Ampex 620-type powered loudspeakers from the 50s...and don't like them on screechy Walkman-type speakers. There is a richness from the 8-inch "full-range" (for the era) driver. There is also a beaminess. Weren't Altec 604s used widely in the 40s and 50s? For modern speakers, I am partial to the Mackie HR824s as a good compromise for price/performance, but of course the Magneplanars mentioned would be great if you had the physical and financial room. Cheers, Richard At 05:20 AM 2/16/2004 -0800, RA Friedman wrote: >Any recommendations for speakers to be used in a sound lab that restores >primarily old, worn 78rpm discs? I'm not doing restorations to go on >commercial CD reissues. I'd like to keep it under $500, but might be >convinced to go higher. >