The Starcaster was designed by Gene Fields to be a high quality instrument, although it was manufactured at a time when Fender's standards had lowered considerably.

The new version, offered in black, natural or aged cherryburst, closely resembles the original guitar but lacks some key features including the master volume control, string-through-body bridge, string tree for four strings, bullet truss rod adjuster and three-bolt neck attachment.

As a result, Starcasters are very rare, but are worth less in today's vintage market than many other semi-hollow guitars from the same period to collectors because of their unpopularity and lack of name endorsers at their time of manufacture.

Sammy James, Jr., guitarist and front man of the Mooney Suzuki, uses a natural finished one and appeared on Late Night with Conan O'Brien with it on June 21, 2007.

He could be seen playing his Starcaster during The Killers' headline slot at Glastonbury Festival 2007, on Later... with Jools Holland for "Read My Mind" and in the videos for "For Reasons Unknown" and "Human".

Arctic Monkeys guitarist Jamie Cook can be seen playing one at the 2009 Reading Festival and in the video for the 2009 single "Crying Lightning".

Like previous signature models, this guitar consists of a single humbucker in the bridge position (namely a Seymour Duncan SH-5 Custom pickup) and one volume knob.