Above is another view of Mr Blackham's unusual Nagra SNN. As far as I can see, apart from not having
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the various anodised legends on the deck plate, also absent are the adjustable AGC threshold knob and
! u* y, O, c- s+ Q7 e. `the transport lock-out 'switch' next to the meter. The cover 'hinge' arrangement differs slightly from later
1 f0 f6 I4 q7 M0 t, \3 P0 pmachines, as does the 'patina' of the anodised finish. A most interesting version, has anyone got another?
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) k6 D7 w, n7 N" O/ |4 _ Z(Apparently yes, I have recently been advised.)
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7 L$ h6 ~: A1 X, c# B: i# d4 I. h( x: KClick on either of the above images for more information.
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' F# F% S. Z- B" L' y* 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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3 ]- m3 s4 Y' y3 O% z: Q8 _Nagra SNS - half track recording at 1 7/8 and 15/16 i.p.s. - surveillance quality recording in Mono
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, T- u& `# `# v% I. zNagra SNST - Stereo recording at 1 7/8 and 15/16 i.p.s. - surveillance quality recording in Stereo
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: g& U3 O) _" ]6 s' YNagra SNSTR (recent) - Stereo recording at 3 3/4 and 1 7/8 i.p.s. - high quality recording in Stereo
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6 L7 P( v0 S) w3 ZApparently 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
F8 l' p! L1 l$ ~+ g" xDSP) 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
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truly Hi-Fi recording, but
the slow speed SNS and the SNST stereo versions are not. Perhaps it might
4 `4 L$ {: G" p1 ^ o5 sbe possible to convert these machines for Hi-Fi use, but this would involve replacing most of the
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electronics and be very expensive.
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$ Y, |5 Y- Y' L: Z3 _Cheaper to buy a rather bette
r stereo
IV-S in the first place!
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) K+ N. K% C7 H! _9 [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
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tape so I approached a tape duplication house in the UK and quite easily obtained a few part used
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'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
5 [- I: Y% ^7 E; }7 xseveral pairs of empty plastic reels. It then was quite a simple matter to wind tape off the pancake and
8 Z% g& X/ N" K8 k$ Donto the Nagra plastic reel (by using the hand crank on the machine). I did this a few years ago and
+ }/ p) ]! \) s2 V8 Rthings may be slightly different these days, but perhaps worth investigating rather than spending some
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