Above is another view of Mr Blackham's unusual Nagra SNN. As far as I can see, apart from not having
5 U- [+ T" f- i+ E$ W S1 kthe various anodised legends on the deck plate, also absent are the adjustable AGC threshold knob and
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the transport lock-out 'switch' next to the meter. The cover 'hinge' arrangement differs slightly from later
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machines, as does the 'patina' of the anodised finish. A most interesting version, has anyone got another?
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- ~" R$ F. M; M0 V3 a, Z' ?(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
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beware, as It is unlikely that these will be the recent versions designed to record high quality music.
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There are now apparently four versions of the Nagra 'SN':
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Nagra 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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Nagra SNSTR (recent) - Stereo recording at 3 3/4 and 1 7/8 i.p.s. - high quality recording in Stereo
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* E( _3 R0 ]4 H4 a6 w% ?' `Apparently for covert surveillance use it was preferable to have two separate recording channels to
2 S# y2 V6 e" R! K; m4 Bhave 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
3 Y2 @# t0 y6 _9 X% V6 X! A9 ? Vrecording time and not fidelity. Actually Nagra made a special playback loudspeaker system (25100
3 u# p+ L) c, f6 f- A. z* eDSP) 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
4 Q, w5 @5 S! o6 }5 i+ K0 ltruly Hi-Fi recording, but
the slow speed SNS and the SNST stereo versions are not. Perhaps it might
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be possible to convert these machines for Hi-Fi use, but this would involve replacing most of the
* R4 m8 @4 S! _ ]2 b4 Eelectronics and be very expensive.
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Cheaper 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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I 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
9 k- l& j$ ?% D' ptape so I approached a tape duplication house in the UK and quite easily obtained a few part used
( ?) `& C2 l- E5 T( h9 u9 M6 Z0 S'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
& G* t( ~5 s9 X. y; p1 @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
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VERY silly money.
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