Dunedain said:

Would be great to get a lossless capture of the mono mix from a print. :)

What's the opinion here among our knowledgeable Star Wars fans as to the restored mono soundtrack, how good (close to it's theatrical quality) does it sound compared to the theatrical stereo soundtrack that has been preserved from laserdisks and such?

Well considering the sources are European VHS recordings of air broadcasts from the 80s, it's actually pretty good. Belbucus did a wonderful job considering what he had to work with.

The only other available source I can think of is Puggo's 16mm project. But it suffers from the inevitable pop, hiss and warble of 16mm optical.

Also know that academy Mono was a really piss poor sound reproduction medium, so what people heard in the theatres back then, wasn't exactly high-fidelity. So like what Catbus said, it's pretty close to what people heard.