Above is another view of Mr Blackham's unusual Nagra SNN. As far as I can see, apart from not having
& E- O( {5 s+ O! w) {the various anodised legends on the deck plate, also absent are the adjustable AGC threshold knob and
M' l7 i" B& ^9 \" rthe 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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(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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: b! @' y2 R2 X; n, H* For those who are looking at the stereo versions of this recorder often to be found on 'Eday', do
: C) W/ [2 K! K- L* z# K Fbeware, as It is unlikely that these will be the recent versions designed to record high quality music.
( S0 u4 u% h7 ?2 V( B. @, uThere 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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8 m5 p: W) }! \# p# p7 D( `2 RNagra 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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. u- \- u; q4 J! a9 L; Y$ 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
% F4 B8 O: ]: u9 jhave 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
5 n: G4 z+ ~& i$ P& ]/ Mrecording 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
5 h" O1 N" ~/ |2 z+ 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
) X) q5 ~1 c$ p: p3 u8 B9 D1 L) qelectronics 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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" _# |. B) e! y; L5 V3 BTape 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
* }9 s2 v' v& p+ Z+ r, R/ p7 f1 ?the little reels of tape for this machine. When I first acquired my example from the BBC naturally I
# u$ E# e8 @5 K4 _ G. d" v& ^wanted to play with it and make some recordings. I knew that the tape was basically re-reeled cassette
/ ^- n5 i+ E3 q( ~8 |# etape 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
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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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