Above is another view of Mr Blackham's unusual Nagra SNN. As far as I can see, apart from not having
4 a% L F. d/ P e$ ythe 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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( I! u2 G. e% q# s(Apparently yes, I have recently been advised.)
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) Y( Q8 K1 D7 Z! PClick 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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- X, _. J8 g0 [+ W& \" N' XNagra 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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& [. x1 V, g2 R- |$ M: GNagra 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
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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
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recording time and not fidelity. Actually Nagra made a special playback loudspeaker system (25100
, f v# S) ?5 V7 I, T# cDSP) with built in equalization to compensate for the quite limited frequency response of these
d, S% m" A' L) x* g3 erecorders. 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
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be possible to convert these machines for Hi-Fi use, but this would involve replacing most of the
6 W9 _! f- l/ N8 c. Felectronics and be very expensive.
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+ E: F+ [) \; s9 ~Cheaper to buy a rather bette
r stereo
IV-S in the first place!
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( S _! E1 `! S! q$ { n! l0 J0 G3 DTape 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
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the 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, y* s/ a) qtape so I approached a tape duplication house in the UK and quite easily obtained a few part used
2 h/ R, {2 `% a9 N'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
5 B9 I+ B \3 F, M0 K/ |$ I6 Qonto 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
3 @' e0 a7 P; w C: Z8 n! V tVERY silly money.
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