Above is another view of Mr Blackham's unusual Nagra SNN. As far as I can see, apart from not having
$ v' M3 Z, _- d8 p" z' qthe various anodised legends on the deck plate, also absent are the adjustable AGC threshold knob and
$ @" @$ v6 _( @4 k( Ithe transport lock-out 'switch' next to the meter. The cover 'hinge' arrangement differs slightly from later
% U) E! F7 ?2 _( L# Cmachines, as does the 'patina' of the anodised finish. A most interesting version, has anyone got another?
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8 A( \7 M( H# d& H4 z6 A(Apparently yes, I have recently been advised.)
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Click on either of the above images for more information.
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* For those who are looking at the stereo versions of this recorder often to be found on 'Eday', do
' x7 W" |0 D& b7 Tbeware, as It is unlikely that these will be the recent versions designed to record high quality music.
3 y5 i. C6 E2 o# n) [/ gThere are now apparently four versions of the Nagra 'SN':
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; g% d1 W# x8 B5 L: l/ QNagra SNN - full track recording at 3 3/4 and 1 7/8 i.p.s. - high quality recording in Mono
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Nagra SNS - half track recording at 1 7/8 and 15/16 i.p.s. - surveillance quality recording in Mono
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Nagra SNST - Stereo recording at 1 7/8 and 15/16 i.p.s. - surveillance quality recording in Stereo
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4 ]; ~3 F$ D/ ^, X% F9 pNagra SNSTR (recent) - Stereo recording at 3 3/4 and 1 7/8 i.p.s. - high quality recording in Stereo
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Apparently for covert surveillance use it was preferable to have two separate recording channels to
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have some chance of capturing a muffled or distant conversations. So these older stereo machines will
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therefore be
optimized for speech recording only, and will also
run at low speed for maximum
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recording time and not fidelity. Actually Nagra made a special playback loudspeaker system (25100
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DSP) with built in equalization to compensate for the quite limited frequency response of these
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recorders. A standard mono Nagra SNN running at 3 and 3/4, like the ones on this page are capable of
( K1 r' i( K- Z2 E& V1 Z+ `truly Hi-Fi recording, but
the slow speed SNS and the SNST stereo versions are not. Perhaps it might
5 f5 [- Z2 O* F& w9 ebe possible to convert these machines for Hi-Fi use, but this would involve replacing most of the
! n9 e$ Q, O2 Y6 F2 L: P" {9 i; ielectronics and be very expensive.
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$ s$ t6 S- M+ H3 w" r+ WCheaper to buy a rather bette
r stereo
IV-S in the first place!
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Tape for the Nagra SN
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1 |; L- p. Z* x3 Y! a% x W% XI have been amazed at the prices some people have been willing to pay on that wild west auction site for
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the little reels of tape for this machine. When I first acquired my example from the BBC naturally I
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wanted to play with it and make some recordings. I knew that the tape was basically re-reeled cassette
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tape so I approached a tape duplication house in the UK and quite easily obtained a few part used
" ]3 k# s# M+ m'pancakes'. These are the un-flanged bulk reels of tape (about 10" dia) that are automatically wound into
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the cassette shells. I then contacted Nagra UK (always helpful) and obtained for around ?5 each
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several pairs of empty plastic reels. It then was quite a simple matter to wind tape off the pancake and
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onto the Nagra plastic reel (by using the hand crank on the machine). I did this a few years ago and
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things may be slightly different these days, but perhaps worth investigating rather than spending some
# m/ ?! j {' _5 p2 V/ [+ zVERY silly money.
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