The Cougar Puri TKL wants to be your next keyboard

If you’re into playing competitive eSports titles, your keyboard can be the difference between a win and a loss. Fast-paced games like Valorant, CS:GO, DOTA, or League of Legends demand a keyboard that can keep up with your APMs (Actions per minute). That is where a good mechanical keyboard comes into play (pun intended). If you didn’t already know, mechanical keyboards consist of spring-activated key switches. They also tend to be on the expensive side in comparison to their membrane keyboard counterparts (where rather than individual switches, the keyboard consists of pressure pads). But just because a keyboard is mechanical, that doesn’t make it the perfect keyboard for you. There are a number of factors to consider, such as layout, switch type, and even weight. Attempting to balance these three factors is the Cougar Puri TKL.

If you’re not familiar with the brand, Cougar has been around since 2008, manufacturing PC cases, power supplies, and cooling systems. Since then, they’ve also gotten into peripherals (keyboards, mice, and headsets). While they might not be as popular as Razer, Logitech, and Corsair, they are known for offering products that have a stellar price-to-performance ratio. In fact, this is exactly what piqued my curiosity in the Puri TKL.

Straight off the bat, the Puri TKL shows off its tenkeyless (TKL) design. This means that the keyboard doesn’t have a 10-key numeric keypad on the right side. You don’t have to be alarmed by this, because all functionalities of the missing keys are still present in the Puri TKL. The advantage here is that because it has less keys, the keyboard has a smaller footprint, meaning you have more space on your table to move your mouse around. This is especially useful if you play at lower DPI settings and tend to move the mouse around a lot, or if you’re limited in terms of desk space. It’s also

ideal for bringing it with you to LAN parties, or a friend’s place, or basically anywhere.

The Puri TKL measures 5.9x14.56x1.57 inches and weighs around 1.2kg. While not exactly heavy, it has sufficient weight to not slide around when you’re having those intense gaming moments. Adding to the weight was something I’ve never actually seen on a keyboard; a magnetized cover. The cover sits snugly on top of the keyboard, protecting it from dust and liquid spills. The body of the keyboard is a mixture of steel and plastic (which explains the weight). Eight screws hold the plastic outer frame of the Puri to the steel body.

Adding to the element of portability, the Puri TKL also comes with a 1.8m detachable cable. This is so that, if you’re on the move, you can remove the cable and throw the keyboard (along with its magnetic cover) in your bag and not worry about the cable getting snagged or damaged during transport. There’s no USB Type-C, but rather a USB Mini B cable. With Type-C cables being the rage these days, one of them would have been convenient, but at the end of the day, a cable is a cable and if the cable works as intended, then that’s all there is to it. The cable can be routed to the left, right or center of the keyboard, depending on your preference, adding even more customizability to it.

As I said in the beginning, one of the key benefits of a mechanical keyboard is that the keys themselves have individual switches. In that regard, the Puri TKL is available in Cherry MX Red, Brown, or Blue switches. While I personally love the click-clack of MX blue switches, MX red switches are preferred by competitive gamers because they can rapidly double-tap or triple-tap keys without getting tired or keypresses not getting registered. So you give up some of the click-clack, but you also gain a faster button press, ideal when you need to make splitsecond moves in FPS or MOBA games.

Having used a ROG Strix Scope with Cherry MX blue switches, making the shift to the Puri TKL took a bit of getting used to. For starters, the smaller footprint had me moving the keyboard around a bit to get it centered so my hands were comfortably placed. The lack of a tactile bump with every keypress also took me a while to get used to so I decided to try out some games. I went through a few sessions of Destiny 2, Overwatch, Battlefield V and Dota 2. While I am by no means a pro or competitive gamer, I immediately noticed that keypresses were less taxing on my fingers, and I could straft (continuous movement from left to right and vice versa), and perform multi-key game actions faster than I would have with my previous keyboard. This again is due to the low amount of force needed in Cherry MX Red switches, as opposed to Cherry MX Blue switches which I use on my daily keyboard. Keeping up with the big boys in mechanical keyboards, the Puri TKL also packs N-key rollover, or "NKRO,". This allows the keyboard to detect all keystrokes no matter how many keys are pressed simultaneously.

In addition to providing their regular functionality, the function keys on the Puri TKL also function as shortcut keys to open File explorer, browser, calculator and also have dedicated media control key as well as volume control keys. These are especially handy if you want to control your PC volume while in game. You can also use the Winlock key to disable the Windows key on the keyboard so that you don't open the Start menu (trust me, it happens a lot more than you would think).

Each key on the Puri can be customized to launch an application or act as a macro (where you create a shortcut for a sequence of actions). While this may not be useful to everyone, those who do can customize the keys to their heart’s content via Cougar’s UIX software. In terms of lighting, the keyboard comes with 20 presets and 10 customizable modes. Additional lighting effects can be configured through the UIX software. The lighting effects are super smooth and entertaining.

Light things up your way

For example, I set the keyboard to reactive lighting where one key press would light up the row that the key was on. I then proceeded to type this sentence and was impressed about the fluidity of the effect. Other effects such as rain, twinkle, and rainbow are brilliantly done, with my personal favorite being steady on a single color. One lighting effect that I was missing was a sound reactive effect; where the keyboard would light up for sound effects such as music or in-game sounds. It’s a somewhat superficial requirement, but maybe Cougar can look into adding the effect via a UIX update in the near future.

Overall, the Puri TKL left a positive impression on me. It has a lot going for it for the price of LRK 18,500/-. The Cherry MX switches are rated at 50 million activations per switch which will last you a long time. The tenkeyless design means a smaller footprint so you save space. The detachable cable means that if you lose the cable, or want a cable of a different length, or even a custom cable, you can get one made to your liking. The protective magnetic cover means your keyboard is safe from dirt and liquids while you're travelling or you’re at a LAN party or tournament. You can store your button assignments in the keyboard’s memory and have it ready to go in a matter of seconds. The lighting effects will make you drool and you’ll spend a considerable amount of time just playing with it (trust me, I did).

In terms of competition with regards to other TKL keyboards, there are much cheaper keyboards from brands such as Armageddon and Gamdias. But because they’re cheap, they also come up short in aspects such as build quality and creature comforts. The HyperX Alloy Core RGB is probably the most suitably matched TKL keyboard, priced in a similar fashion to the Puri TKL but it’s a membrane keyboard. While that’s not necessarily a bad thing, it makes sense to get a mechanical keyboard, since you’re spending roughly the same amount. Plus, you can get more wallet friendly membrane keyboards as well.

If you’re in the market for a solid, compact keyboard that’s affordable, and has a lot of tricks up its sleeve, and will last you a long time, definitely take a look at the Cougar Puri TKL.