Above is another view of Mr Blackham's unusual Nagra SNN. As far as I can see, apart from not having
9 _5 i! M* _9 v! m/ U: F" ^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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- g; \) a( t' e% K* y(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
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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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5 K( A/ j4 d" ENagra 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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0 P, ^* O" v& i1 s: q( ^$ S. HNagra SNSTR (recent) - Stereo recording at 3 3/4 and 1 7/8 i.p.s. - high quality recording in Stereo
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7 t4 u; |0 w3 T# z0 }' z' B; YApparently 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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optimized for speech recording only, and will also
run at low speed for maximum
( u. Y0 r7 M" Z- ^" A& Grecording time and not fidelity. Actually Nagra made a special playback loudspeaker system (25100
- C9 K' I2 P/ d. ODSP) 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
" F0 r P Y e) s( T+ e4 i+ obe possible to convert these machines for Hi-Fi use, but this would involve replacing most of the
2 e% d Y! ^ |& C; c, melectronics 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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, F# B7 u. B4 AI have been amazed at the prices some people have been willing to pay on that wild west auction site for
4 S8 d, O5 ?+ W- mthe 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
C+ T3 t3 \1 {1 l8 G' j S0 g! m: Htape so I approached a tape duplication house in the UK and quite easily obtained a few part used
' }" [ D0 k9 h8 P! T% I'pancakes'. These are the un-flanged bulk reels of tape (about 10" dia) that are automatically wound into
$ p2 W6 K2 ?1 [/ A% W; kthe cassette shells. I then contacted Nagra UK (always helpful) and obtained for around ?5 each
9 Z% \6 [ q* ~, w$ {- m& Pseveral 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
5 S. H$ b- E) t3 n5 _! {, C4 lthings 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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