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The complete list of EU regulations for electrical safety is [http://ec.europa.eu/enterprise/policies/european-standards/documents/harmonised-standards-legislation/list-references/low-voltage/index_en.htm here]. There's a lot of regulations. Most of them are aimed at mass-produced consumer appliances. There's even a regulation for safety in "heated gullies for roof drainage". But there's no mention of music gear.
Because in the 1980s, Japanese companies such as Korg, Roland and Yamaha started to seize the market for music synthesizers, the EU demanded that those firms start meeting EU regulations for electrical safety. To avoid the high cost of electrical-safety testing and certification by independent testing labs (a requirement in most of the world), these firms started making gear that ran from AC adapters only. The change from analog circuitry to microprocessors at the same time helped to facilitate this, by reducing power consumption and simplifying power supply design.
How does your modular synthesizer fit into all this? It's a "loophole" in the law that many modular cabinet builders take advantage of. Because a modular synth could be considered a "kit", requiring some assembly by the end-user, most electrical-safety laws exempt it. If they had tried to regulate electronic kits, they very likely would have killed off the kit industry, and made it almost impossible for hobbyists to obtain components to experiment with. Apparently Doepfer, the world's largest maker of modular synths and cabinets, has been threatened by the German safety authorities over safety testing, in spite of the "kit loophole"; so Doepfer spends some $12000-15000 having samples of each new cabinet design tested by an independent lab. This is done only to silence bureaucrats, and has no actual bearing on sales of the cabinets elsewhere in the world. Safety standards in the USA are much less severe, and safety testing is only undertaken by mass-producers or firms wishing to minimize their legal liability. Because most people would consider modular synthesizers to be "professional audio" products, requiring some skill and knowledge to use, they have not been subject to the same severe safety standards that usually apply to home appliances such as TV sets. However, this does not mean such products might not attract a major product-liability lawsuit in the future; the small sales and specialized nature of the modular synth simply make it unlikely. A greedy liability attorney would not pursue a tort claim for injury against a company that grosses less than US$100k/year, simply because he could not be assured of receiving a large fee should he win. Small synth makers are usually sole-proprietor firms with almost no financial resources, making them undesirable targets for a tort claim.
== RFI and "EMC" ==
== Materials ==
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