For PC gamers, 🔴upgrades are inevitable. Like it or not, you're eventually going to have to replace just about every piece of hardware in your computer. While swapping out video cards, processors, ram, and hard drives is just a fact of life, it's far less common to upgrade your entire case. If you're like me, you probably think of your basic tower as a box that holds all your valuable hardware. Cougar shattered that misconception for me with the DarkBlade-G RGB Tower. This case has amazing accessibility, an incredibly thoughtful design that takes into account airflow and organization, and, not for nothing, looks pretty rad, too.
Outside Looking In
Before I get inside the tower, I'd like to start with the design from an aesthetic standpoint. A lot of gaming hardware and accesso🏅ries seem to think painting something neon green and slapping an RGB light on it is all we're looking for, but Cougar has always been different. The front of the case is brushed aluminum with an asymmetrical design that I find really eye-catching. Between the aluminum front cover and the recessed opaque panel is a vertical light strip that runs all the way up. The lighting on the DarkBlade-G accents the case and adds just enough personality without being gaudy. I love the look of this tower lit up.
Both sides of the case are thick, removableꦛ glass panes. Accessing the case couldn't be easier, and the "open floor plan" design lets you show off your hardware and RGB components inside♍ (like the Cougar Aqua 240 liquid cooler I use). I've used other towers that had hinged doors, and I much prefer the removable sides. It's easy to get into and looks great.
The top, bottom, and front of the casꦿe (behind the front cover) are equipped with durable air filters. If you remove the top filter you can actually reach right into the case if you prefer quick access that way, while the bottom filter slides off. While I love the look of an "open" case, I also really appreciate that my delicate components are safely contained behind glass and air filters. The design of the tower shows that Cougar understands the things that matter most in a tower.
Putting It Together
The inside🦂 of the tower is essentially divided into two halves: on the left side is where your motherboard, fans, and video card will mount, while the right has a is where your power supply and hard driv൲es live. Some of the organization of this tower is pure genius, while some I think could use a bit of refinement.
One of the things I love the most about this tower is the hard drive drawers. The drawers are stacked at the fron🌺t of the tower away from all major heat sources and have little tabs you can pinch to slide out your drives. Damaging a hard drive is arguably more detrimental than any other piece of hardware because of the valuable information you store on your PC, so I really appreciate that they are safely secured and easily accessible in this layout. ♚This also makes it very easy to run your harness from the drives to your power supply since they are on the same side.
Speaking of the power supply, I have a bit of a hard time making mine fit. Once it was in place I had no problem mounting it, but it fits into such a small narrow compartment at the back of the tower that just forcing it in with the built-in mounting tabs mine has was really difficult. Perhaps your power supply doesn't have these tabs, but it cause💃d a bit of an issue for me. Once it was in, plugging cables into it became a separate challenge. It's the only part of the case that's hard to access, and I was really struggling with it.
On the other side, you'll mount your motherboard near the top of the case to the frame, which I find to be quite sturdy. Because your video cards needs to be mounted to your mobo about midway up tꦫhe tower (for me), there is a little adjustable arm that you can use to support the weight up the card so it doesn't disconnect. It's a really simple solution, but it works and you can barely tell it's there.
For some reason, I have a proble🐠m with the way the cutout for my video card is aligned. I cannot plug a DisplayPort cable to my video card cleanly because of the misalignment. I actually had to plug the cable in first before securing the video card to the case and I still have no idea why it doesn't quite line up.
The cable management is great, and there's even a 𒉰little cover on the right side you can hide your cables behind. I found that a number of my connectors had to be stretched to the max and actually couldn't be hidden behind the cable management door. I like the idea, but, at least for my components, it didn't work quite as well as I hoped. Luckily, that side of the computer rests against my desk and I shouldn't really need ꦗto look at it or open it much at all.
Get Yourself A Tower That Looks Good And Adds Something To Your Setup
For me, the main benefits of the DarkBlader-G are the excellent organization of hardware, the easy access, an🐻d the remarkably attractive design. Digging around in your PC when something goes wrong can be overwhelming and frustrating, but the clever use of space and removable side panels makes it very easy to work with this tower. I love the design, and one more RGB component to program in my office is never a bad thing. There are a couple of nitpicky things I would change about it, but overall I love this case and I expect it to be with me for a long time.
A DarkBlader-G was provided to TheGamer for tඣhis review. You can learn more about 🌃the tower on .