Hi all,  For those looking for a proper needle to play these records:
The Shure company just released a new specially designed cartridge for
playing 78 RPM.  The model is M78S and more info can be found at

    http://www.shure,com/catphono_hifi.html

For software to de-noise your recordings before you put them on CD, you
could try the program D/noise.  It is made by a Mr. Popovic and it can
be found on

    http://www.fmah.com/

I tried a demo version on a short piece of music in *.wav format,
and I think it is working quite well.

cheers,
Hans van Oost, Netherlands