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
0 P& \$ h9 C) h% S! Lmachines, 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
1 m2 P) C, e( z( Tbeware, 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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) ]0 y" s9 {6 v) a& ~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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Apparently for covert surveillance use it was preferable to have two separate recording channels to
n, ~% p# @- S! J5 @5 shave 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
/ s# {' y" |) ]/ N/ ~! irecording time and not fidelity. Actually Nagra made a special playback loudspeaker system (25100
" F( [5 t/ ^ y) C5 c2 W" m/ p: L2 }DSP) with built in equalization to compensate for the quite limited frequency response of these
8 D" F ]! T7 Crecorders. A standard mono Nagra SNN running at 3 and 3/4, like the ones on this page are capable of
) } h' ?* [/ {truly Hi-Fi recording, but
the slow speed SNS and the SNST stereo versions are not. Perhaps it might
1 V1 k! {) @4 G- g# Pbe possible to convert these machines for Hi-Fi use, but this would involve replacing most of the
" d6 m: c5 h' Y- k4 Felectronics and be very expensive.
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+ C6 V3 D6 b. u" c* BCheaper 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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6 H# V* L( D2 @- d* ?2 z9 v" qI have been amazed at the prices some people have been willing to pay on that wild west auction site for
. l0 q1 [2 |: n2 @ jthe 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
# x& `$ u% w& a0 \4 g$ e0 f% Qtape 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
7 o+ K. K4 i5 \% g4 sthings may be slightly different these days, but perhaps worth investigating rather than spending some
! H ]5 b0 @- J& l JVERY silly money.
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