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
( Q- B3 e, d5 P1 Ythe 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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/ c+ ]- e7 r2 \* l' Z/ \* 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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0 i, H. U9 k J6 K" cNagra 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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( x! J* P' s xApparently for covert surveillance use it was preferable to have two separate recording channels to
* ]8 J b" k! \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
( P e4 i' f6 a4 i: m7 Orecording 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
( e3 C& y2 S9 y$ G! Jrecorders. 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
9 b* P: n3 W+ T) ?be 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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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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# x; k7 E8 X. \9 Z' K# @I have been amazed at the prices some people have been willing to pay on that wild west auction site for
/ G, ^' H3 {) q6 X( H2 y- V. ethe 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
7 F! U4 l( A- C J8 `" X% G'pancakes'. These are the un-flanged bulk reels of tape (about 10" dia) that are automatically wound into
: o Y" A) G T# u5 p. p1 [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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