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
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the 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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\! n! Q9 a. sClick 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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4 M+ ?* l' w1 C7 dNagra 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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" p2 J' L& }3 \6 d) RApparently 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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therefore be
optimized for speech recording only, and will also
run at low speed for maximum
* x4 E. R$ D3 R" Mrecording time and not fidelity. Actually Nagra made a special playback loudspeaker system (25100
2 q* L. N; e1 i4 p* [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
0 G6 R! x) b* E) E: e7 lbe 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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0 N1 E G7 H/ y2 `Cheaper to buy a rather bette
r stereo
IV-S in the first place!
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4 b2 H8 d2 }4 B, a s6 BTape for the Nagra SN
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, C3 R/ m2 @; A* L0 {" H& _I have been amazed at the prices some people have been willing to pay on that wild west auction site for
; Z0 O% N7 t2 g; y0 N6 sthe 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
( F1 p' \& K! {2 x2 |7 I# \; i* Ftape so I approached a tape duplication house in the UK and quite easily obtained a few part used
$ o( |- R$ d) d7 Q0 s'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
0 h8 A4 l+ Y9 `1 `5 sseveral pairs of empty plastic reels. It then was quite a simple matter to wind tape off the pancake and
. \# i) \9 E1 uonto 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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