Disassembly

Disassembly of the Mad Catz STRIKE 13 is fairly simple owing to the aluminium alloy frame construction. All ten Phillips head screws keep things together, but can be accessed by removing specific keycaps as seen above. Once done, the top can be lifted off the bottom plastic panel by enough to access and dislodge the internal USB cable connecting the two before fully removing the bottom panel.


The bottom panel is made out of ABS plastic, and in a nice surprise, we see the use of thick foam on the inside. This will help dampen the sound of typing on the keyboard and is usually a feature not seen on pre-built keyboards. Good on Mad Catz for doing this!


The rest of the keyboard has the switches soldered onto a red PCB through the aluminium alloy frame, so further disassembly requires bringing out a desoldering gun, which has us stop here. Solder quality is really good, and everything is likely machine made and assembled to where we don't even see any excess flux or solder points tall enough to prick fingers. Powering the keyboard is a Vision VS11K09A USB microcontroller, and there's another module in the form of the Vision VS01. There's no useful information online for either of these, unfortunately. As is the norm, all the components are soldered onto a multi-layer PCB. The side view also gives a better look at the thickness of the used aluminium alloy frame.

Before we move on, be advised that disassembly may void the warranty and that TechPowerUp is not liable for any damages incurred if you decide to go ahead and do so anyway.