Above is another view of Mr Blackham's unusual Nagra SNN. As far as I can see, apart from not having
: r V" o( ]' Rthe 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
. Q; ^( k5 O6 emachines, as does the 'patina' of the anodised finish. A most interesting version, has anyone got another?
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(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
; O4 q$ M5 ^$ F- A7 | Tbeware, as It is unlikely that these will be the recent versions designed to record high quality music.
/ G/ Z( N/ q) ~! B+ SThere are now apparently four versions of the Nagra 'SN':
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7 e% ~+ b- ]1 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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/ E7 l3 o% _" jNagra SNST - Stereo recording at 1 7/8 and 15/16 i.p.s. - surveillance quality recording in Stereo
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' g0 c! [6 R8 g2 ^5 JNagra 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
; t) x: ]0 C( ^* |2 I g# y9 thave 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
9 n: I5 [3 c& I! ^recording time and not fidelity. Actually Nagra made a special playback loudspeaker system (25100
- U2 C9 [7 e% L7 p+ b, EDSP) with built in equalization to compensate for the quite limited frequency response of these
1 P. n/ ]$ Z& ]0 `2 o- Xrecorders. 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
h+ F" B/ r# K$ P6 X0 V3 B% e$ ~! Telectronics and be very expensive.
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2 @; r3 _/ ?0 M3 v, l0 E4 d" wCheaper to buy a rather bette
r stereo
IV-S in the first place!
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& @8 ^5 o) r) j0 M! ^- n, iTape 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
w. p8 b: a! B; |6 J _( Z0 Z2 v; Kwanted to play with it and make some recordings. I knew that the tape was basically re-reeled cassette
+ T, I+ V2 m [( d7 F* c4 Q9 xtape 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
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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
* ?, h* F# i2 c! I* Gthings may be slightly different these days, but perhaps worth investigating rather than spending some
6 j: l' f1 Y% ^ x) n, f# k" _VERY silly money.
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