August 28, 2014
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WireWorld Starlight 7 USB 3 & Western Digital 2TB EHD, Part 1
This initial installment will cover two audio-related products: WireWorld's Starlight 7 USB 3 cable and the Western Digital My Passport Slim 2TB external hard drive.
The Starlight 7 is the first audio-level quality USB 3 cable that I am aware of and was purchased from Ivan Messer of Legend Audio & Video located in Parkland, Florida. The 1 meter cable has a list price of $120 and was shipped directly to me from WireWorld.
Front of Box
Rear of Box
The Starlight 7 USB 3 cable uses WireWorld's Symmetricon construction technique and is based on the same formulation as its HDMI cables. As such, it is much wider than the standard USB 3 cable that accompanied my WD Passport Slim EHD.
Open Clamshell Container
The Starlight 7 is comprised of 12 signal conductors of silver clad 24 average gauge oxygen free copper plus seven 20 average gauge oxygen free copper conductors that are physically separated from the signal conductors used to carry the 5V power portion of the transmission.
Conductor Description
The Western Digital EHD requires a Micro-B connection (the A-side is standard) and so the STZ version of the Starlight 7 was ordered.
Micro-B Connector
The Western Digital My Passport Slim is a 2 terabyte (2TB) external hard drive. I have purchased two of these hard drives (one functions as a back-up to the primary drive) from Amazon. One reason I chose this particular model is because it has a metal casing which I thought would help with heat dissipation. I use this EHD to store some of my music files that have been created from ripping a portion of my CD collection using either dBPoweramp or JRiver Media Center 19. Each of these software packages has its own advantages and may be covered in another, possibly future, installment. The WD EHD may be plugged directly into my Oppo 105D BD/Universal Player through one of the latter's three USB A slots or if I choose, I can have the EHD plugged into my laptop PC and stream the music files wirelessly to the Oppo.
Western Digital EHD
The next installment will describe the sound of the Starlight 7 versus the stock cable that came with the WD EHD. A hint regarding my findings so far: Patience is rewarded.
Comments (2)
Nice! How do you get the border around your photos?
As far as I know, you can't. Just another area where I feel Xanga 2 is inferior to the legacy system.