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
& v4 h# q7 |6 w3 L9 P% ?; `the transport lock-out 'switch' next to the meter. The cover 'hinge' arrangement differs slightly from later
- n# p, |6 P9 N1 Dmachines, as does the 'patina' of the anodised finish. A most interesting version, has anyone got another?
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3 e c1 H: ~5 ]$ N7 }(Apparently yes, I have recently been advised.)
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- b2 C+ r* u2 K7 j( u& rClick on either of the above images for more information.
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! F5 O L/ E4 y* t0 ?* 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.
6 T: ^. h. e" x9 Y$ wThere 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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l3 c8 \& o" m+ b+ VApparently 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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optimized for speech recording only, and will also
run at low speed for maximum
+ }+ A4 W2 `& M5 Vrecording 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
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truly 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
$ X2 o9 b8 C$ {3 S& Melectronics 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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4 U6 ~' r" |* ^( z' U: k" q; \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
/ E8 K. q( W2 N+ lwanted 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
5 f" x7 Y; f6 b6 V% r* T4 k'pancakes'. These are the un-flanged bulk reels of tape (about 10" dia) that are automatically wound into
! n: ^+ n3 f1 J4 H) D, i( p$ Dthe 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
, X$ W2 w9 w$ g( I8 z, c: Y2 hthings 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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