OK I misremembered, the Nova Drive is the only one that needs 380mA, the rest of the nova range need a
stabilised 300mA. A TC tech once told me that they typically draw 50mA above the spec when booting up, but then settle down quickly to rated draw. In reality, I prefer to have an overrated PSU as brownouts in local mains power tend to stress things badly. Still, 400mA should be enough for a Nova Delay, giving you a comfortable 25% leeway.
Ground loops happen when
more than one point in an audio system is connected to ground. Not having a ground on a supply is rarely a problem - it's
too many grounds that causes problems. Audio connections include a ground, so any device connected to a system which has one component that is grounded is grounded by that device.
Lifting superfluous grounds (by simply disconnecting the ground in the mains plug) is one way of tackling the problem, but there is one
crucial caveat - if that device is used without a connection to a grounded audio system it becomes
potentially lethal and this method is actually illegal. So if you disconnect the mains ground on your Moog it will only be safe when connected to your grounded mixer or amp - if you use it unplugged with headphones and something goes wrong, you can be shocked. Still, disconnecting a mains ground can be a useful way of troubleshooting a problem if only used temporarily to confirm that the ground of a specific unit is causing a problem.
The best, safest cure for the problem is to use a passive DI box on the audio output of a problem unit. A DI basically uses a transformer to decouple its audio input and output from one another - including the ground. As an added bonus, good transformer units (like the Radials) often add some tonal benefits to electronic instruments and provide low z balanced outputs suitable for mixers and/or long cable runs.
There are also some special plug adaptors that disconnect the mains ground, but do it safely by means of a partial ground lift. Unfortunately I don't know of any available locally.
epictring wrote
Alan I don't know if this means something, but you remember the mixer you sold me?
When I plug the moog into that no problem, and when I plug the MASTER OUT or headphone out of the mixer into the ND pedal everything is still fine. Does this mixer act as a passive DI by any chance?
Well, not passive, but active (there are electronic preamps in it), but yes, it will perform many of the functions of a DI (balanced, low z outputs) and it might even have isolating inputs. FYI, you can use the effects send on that to send the signal to the delay too (then you can use it on more than one instrument at a time if you want).
