Introduction

Cougar Gaming, or simply Cougar as shall be referred to henceforth in this review, is not a new brand to TechPowerUp editors. Indeed, we have covered many of their cases, which continue to offer something different than the status quo of the black box market today. When their representatives contacted us to see if we would be interested in checking out their keyboards, I simply had to say yes to see what they were doing in this regard. Somehow, I ended up with not one, but three Cougar keyboards at my doorstep, and today, we take a look at the first of these in the form of a tenkeyless (TKL) keyboard. Thanks again to Cougar for providing a review sample for us to examine.


The PURI TKL is an 87-key keyboard, as the name suggests, at least when it comes to the US ANSI layout for the sample I have here. Cougar has a good retail channel spread around the globe and supports other layouts and languages as they deem fit. One of the driving points that went into the design of the PURI TKL was to make it portable and easy to transition to from your current keyboard. A TKL form factor works well here, for gaming or otherwise, and Cougar also provides what appears to be a substantial cover to go along with it. We will see more of this and other things in the review, but begin with a look at the specifications below.

Specifications

Packaging and Accessories

Over time, I have come to associate the orange color with the Cougar brand, and the packaging for the PURI TKL only reinforces that notion with its use of lots of orange accents on an otherwise black cardboard box. On the front is the company logo, again in orange, and also the Cherry logo that might as well be orange too, the way it has come off here. The marketing tagline below the product name is, you guessed it, in orange. This is followed up on the back and sides with product illustrations, specs, and more marketing features with plenty of orange highlights. There are two seals and a double flap in the middle to help keep the contents in check during shipping and handling.


Opening the box, we see the keyboard immediately in a plastic wrap, and there is a foam sheet on the top and under the keyboard for protection. The keyboard is also placed within a cardboard inlay for more protection, which is good to see. A product guide (online version here) along with a company brochure can be seen underneath the keyboard, and the other accessories are found in the cardboard compartment that is cutout at the top. Here, we see the keyboard cable and a set of replacement keycaps with a puller.


The keyboard cable is detachable, as seen above, and sleeved well in black to go with the rest of the keyboard. It terminates in a gold-plated male mini-USB connector on one end and a gold-plated male USB Type-A on the other. The plating is to minimize oxidation of the metal contacts, but the use of the mini-USB connector is interesting in that it is rated to be less durable than even micro-USB for attachments and detachments. Cougar likely believes customers will not be detaching the cable thousands of times, and the larger connector will fare better in case of accidental hits to the keyboard.

Also included with the keyboard is a plastic ring-style keycap puller and eight metal keycaps—four for WASD and another four for the arrow keys—to add some flair to the keyboard if you so desire. I would have preferred to see a wire-style keycap puller to minimize chances of scratching the sides of the keycaps, but this is still better than nothing. The legends on the replacement keycaps are also translucent to allow lighting through, which will go well with the backlighting support on the PURI TKL keyboard.