Cougar LX 500w Bronze Fully Modular Power Supply Review

A Closer Look

Cougar has stuck with the compact design and it’s clearly visible. There can sometimes be concerns with cooling over such small power suppliers, however, their previous models which were equally small did not seem to find this to be a problem and as such we don’t anticipate it being one here either.

Similar to previous designs, the fan is unusually set higher than we usually see. I’m certainly not saying that PSU fans are always slap bang in the center, but the positioning here is, if nothing else, a curiosity. You do, however, have that nice Cougar logo right in the center which does a good job at grabbing your eye.

We again find that to the back plate, the design that Cougar uses has changed very little. You still have that nice large honeycomb layout which should allow for a good solid air flow. Albeit, it could also possibly act as a dust magnet.

As this is a fully modular design, the banks of inputs are nice and clearly labelled. Unfortunately, as you can see in the picture, on our model the sticker which is placed over here is beginning to peal. It’s for this reason that many manufacturers simply have the socket placements engraved into the metal.

I do like how on the PCI-E ports they have put them opposite each other. This means that the removal/relocation of cables is a lot easier work on the fingers. That being said though, the layout is still rather cramped and despite this effort, it’s still fiddly work when you start to get everything connected.

Interior

As per the prior model, the interior of the power supply is very well presented. You have two large banks of heat syncs around the middle. As this is a compact design, there isn’t a lot of room, but Cougar has made a strong effort to try and get a decent amount of space between each component.

With this being non-modular as well, definite improvements are seen in reducing the internal clutter. Dare I say as well, the actual parts look to be better quality and generally assembled to a much higher standard than we saw in the Cougar STX.

Unfortunately, due to the location of the capacitor, I struggled (as you can see) to get a nice clear photo of the details. What we can see, however, is that Teapo is the manufacturer of the main capacitor and that they are rated to 400v at 270 with a temperature of 85.5c. This is slightly surprising as Cougar appears to have switched from Chinese company CapXon to Taiwanese company Teapo. This might be a good move as the capacitor in the Cougar LX 500 looks a lot more substantial in design, even to the point that unlike in the STX, they haven’t used a massive lump of glue to hold it in place.

The Cougar LX also sees an upgrade to the fan which now uses hydrodynamic bearings for more efficient and effective air movement. For a compact PSU, good air movement is essential and again this appears to be a smart design choice.

Important – Please Read

To understand the results on the new few pages, please take the time to read our detailed testing methodology page. The next page of this review will help you understand what the results of our testing mean, and educate you on the various qualities we look for in a good PSU.