Above is another view of Mr Blackham's unusual Nagra SNN. As far as I can see, apart from not having
7 q( t2 C: a4 I! M3 ?% ythe 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
- L1 S! Z* x5 G. g+ Q( Ymachines, 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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" ? @' i5 C' G Q. N" P9 ?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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2 R/ P9 W$ m8 B' [/ T6 s/ y0 ]- wNagra 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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Apparently for covert surveillance use it was preferable to have two separate recording channels to
! {+ {+ H% U( V+ f/ S1 Whave 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
( v3 `) k1 m5 u2 sDSP) 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
7 |& M, Z8 C( E6 N) g1 r$ @+ ftruly Hi-Fi recording, but
the slow speed SNS and the SNST stereo versions are not. Perhaps it might
5 `1 G0 O8 V6 cbe possible to convert these machines for Hi-Fi use, but this would involve replacing most of the
/ ~( M$ G; W7 zelectronics and be very expensive.
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5 f" [- w9 |! A* ?' p5 YCheaper 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
3 ?8 A9 I4 J# R6 n5 F* R7 Dthe little reels of tape for this machine. When I first acquired my example from the BBC naturally I
* J( ~9 [& ~! t3 |) i; q1 Uwanted 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
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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
0 I9 z w" X; Z! z/ `things may be slightly different these days, but perhaps worth investigating rather than spending some
7 k1 c }% k$ P- G- `' BVERY silly money.
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