What's sad is that it seems there are a lot of people at Lucasfilm who want the original films restored but "they must obey their master." Sansweet at the comic con basically admitted this when he said something about wanting to do something special for the fans (with what was to be individual releases of just the 2004 versions) and this is the most Lucas would permit.
The official site has screenshot comparisons of the '77/'04 versions. I know they're at a small size but the original screens look rather good against the new ones.