nagra 4.2 to zoom h1

[Matthew Thompson]

Hello,

I'm new to JWSOUND, and I'm not sure if this is the appropriate place for this post....but...

I am wondering if anyone here has experience connecting a nagra 4.2 to a portable recorder.  I hope to use my zoom h1.  I know that I can connect the nagra to the zoom using a banana plug to 1/4 adapter, but will the quality suffer?

Any advice is appreciated.

thanks

Matt

[studiomprd]

Hi, and welcome

" but will the quality suffer? "

by going from a NAGRA to a Zoom..??

Nah...

 

You really should consider visiting our friend Richard Van Dyke at Professional Sound's NOLA office!

 

and BTW: you need to do some reading: Jay Rose's books at www.dplay.com

[Jay Rose]

What are you trying to accomplish? Dub a 1/4" playback to digital? Record digitally but use the N4's preamp? Double-record for safety? 

 

In any event, from the N4's manual:

 

When the "LINE AND PHONES" switch is in the position "TAPE", the line out- 

put voltage is 4.4 V into 600 Ωwhile playing back a tape recorded at 0 dB. The Nagra 4.2 can record at a 

level 4 dB higher than this, thus the maximum line output voltage will be 7 V. Unloaded, these voltages will 

be 10% greater. The line output uses two 4 mm banana sockets. It is the secondary of a transformer and is 

floating. 

 

This means

1)  2 bananas to a stereo mini, or 3 bananas to that mini with one connecting N4 ground to mini sleeve, probably won't give you much of a signal at all. If you hear anything, it'll be because of leakage through ground in the Zoom... and only if you listen to the voltage developed between the two tracks of the Zoom. If you set the Zoom to mono record and it sums the inputs, you're guaranteed to get nothing.

 

This is because of the difference between a balanced and unbalanced circuit. That's in my books.

 

2) To get a signal, you'll need to connect one of the N's bananas to ground and both to sleeve of the mini, and connect the other to the tip of a mini. That's in the books also.

 

3) The Nagra output is about 24 dB hotter than the Zoom is looking for... possibly more, unless you give it a terminating resistor. (Loaded vs unloaded is in the books.) It'll be horribly distorted even before it gets to Zoom's volume control. The signal won't be fixable.

 

You'll need a pad. Guess where you can find the proper resistor values...

 

IF YOU'RE USING THE NAGRA AS A PREAMP ONLY:

 

4) Once you've got the levels properly padded, the Zoom will do an acceptable job of recording a mono digital file. Frequency response and s/n (in the book) won't be much different from a well maintained Nagra using low-print tape at 7 1/2. 

 

5)  Some people will claim that the Nagra does an inherently better job of recording, but if you hook things up properly and calibrate them absolutely perfectly, there's no measurable advantage over a well-tuned Nagra... and much advantage over a typical school Nagra with bias and azimuth out of alignment.

 

6)  Some will also say the Nagra imparts an analog magic to its recording. It's preamps are certainly better than the Zoom... but without testing the Zoom, I can't say if Nagra's advantage gets lost when you go into the Zoom line input. (If Zoom wants to give me a recorder, I'll be glad to test it and publish the specs.)  And most of the analog magic happens in the magnetic recording process, which you wouldn't be using.

 

7)  A little measurement will be necessary, since Nagra doesn't give a voltage spec for using the bananas in Direct (preamp-out) mode.

 

What doesn't deserve a number is the point that Zoom uses 1/8" jacks. Your 1/4 adapter will have a hard time fitting in the hole. And that's without the above considerations.

[Matthew Thompson]

Thanks guys!  Clearly I have some learning to do...

 

@Jay:  I am trying to dub a 1/4" playback to digital.

 

@studiomprd: I am buying the Nagra from Prosound.  I will definitely have a talk with them about this.

 

I haven't received the Nagra yet.  Maybe this post was a little premature, but thanks for the info!  I'm just looking for a way

to digitize recordings that I make with the Nagra (ie. I will not be using it as a preamp only...)

[mikewest]

Use the headphone out of the Nagra it's an unbalanced signal from the output transformer

It will offer the correct level without padding

 

mike

[Cloud Wang]

i just got myself a 4.2S recently,superb pre-amp,love that sound a lot. The folks at Coffey sound made me some Tuchel output cable for nagra.

The signal is sent to my zaxcom TRX742 or STA/TRX900 for a wireless stereo recording. And i love it.