The Wireworld Starlight 7 is a well constructed, flexible and pretty snazzy coloured cable. Sitting in the lower mid-price band of USB cables (£99.95 for a 1m length) it is the next up the Wireworld line to the multi-award winning Ultraviolet which is a cable which I had previously owned for a prolonged period of time with my Mac Mini due to its warm and pleasant easy listening character that is very favourable to digital playback.
I received two Starlight cables from The UK Distributor, one had an ordinary type B connector on the end and the other with a mini B connector.
The cable is very easy to route around the back of a rack and due to it being flat, bends around other pieces of equipment and shelf edges very easily. The cable is lightweight, very well built and has nice gold connectors.

The Sound

Connecting the Starlight to my Mac and streaming music with Amarra 2.5 the cable has similar qualities of presentation as the UltraViolet but with a fair gain in detail and sparkle in the top end, a warm rounded midrange leading into a firm bass, solid and full. I found the Ultraviolet to be much warmer throughout the range and not as revealing of smaller inner details as the Starlight.

Male vocals were strong and fleshed out and women’s vocals had a good smoothness to their upper registers. Instruments had good timbre but not as naturally true as the likes of the higher priced TQ Black Diamond. Due to the warmer nature of the cable it can lack that extra little ring or rasp at the end of a note to give the most convincing of performances but what it does put forward is an utterly musical and enjoyable presentation.

Dynamics from the cable are fairly average really, not huge and fatiguing nor too soft and gentle, so I may sound like a politician when I say they’re just “nice”.

I go into detail in my Q N K T C review about the DAC being fed by the Starlight with the mini B type connector and how the overall ‘Class A’ flavoured sound of the combination was extremely enjoyable and very musical so I won’t touch on it too much here, although I will mention that I found the Starlight to be great with upper frequency detail and air which coupled with mid and lower end warmth sounded great.

Comparing the Chord Silver Plus with the Starlight7 into the TotalDAC was interesting. The Chord has more of an emphasis on a detail ridden sound – a bit more crash, wallop bang whilst the Starlight just cruises along in an easier fashion reproducing all the details I had heard from the more revealing Chord but in a less forceful and smoother manner. Hearing the Chord allows the listener to really pick out details and dynamics and on first inspection I though ‘there’s more going on here’ but hooking the Wireworld back up proved that it was a characterisation difference not a lack of ability. Deeper rolling extended bass was an advantage of the Starlight, a more natural rendition of an instruments trailing edge. The Chord is exciting and great for lower listening levels but for vocals and instruments the a Wireworld really explores the music better.

Once again in detail on the Resonessence Labs Herus review I explore the Wireworld further, I concluded that out of all the USB cables I used I found the Starlight 7 to be a very musical match for the little DAC/amp adding a nice bit of smoothness to some quite revealing headphones I had partnered with the device.

Conclusion

The Wireworld Starlight performed admirably in my system using the two configurations sent to me and with the products tested. The sound could be referred to as ‘safe’ but is also one of detail, balance and warmth. Forgiving may be a good phrase to use with this cable – it has a very forgiving nature which takes away any edginess which digital equipment can inject into the system and also lends its hand to a similar take with poorer recordings.

The Ultraviolet was a great award winning cable but the Starlight is a bit of a leap ahead in detail retrieval and resolution, yet still having that gentler, easy to listen to character than that of the Chord Silverplus.

Overall the Wireworld Starlight is a solid performer at a great price point.

Recommended for build quality and sound per pound.

Author – Danny Worth

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