I stumbled accross this Madcatz R.A.T. 7 gaming mouse while looking for defective gaming hardware on eBay. It was listed as working except for the left button. I never buy expensive ''high-end'' hardware because I usualy do not think it is worth the high price tags and can't really justify such purchase when regular hardware do the job for me. But at 20$ with shippnig included, I tought it should be an easy fix and bought it. Once I received it, I did the first thing I always do when I get something second-hand, clean it and de-infect it. I felt it was even more important for something like a computer mouse which is handled for hour. I then proceeded to dissassemble it and quickly found out that it wasn't using regular SMD push button like I was expecting but sub-miniature snap-action switches that are much more sensible and reactive than regular. I did not have that kind of SPDT switch in my parts bin but knowing how they are made inside, I tought I might be lucky and be able to fix the broken switch without replacing it. I figured the thin contact sheet inside the switch got pressed too hard or too many time and might have bend down enough as to no longer make any contact with the terminal when pressed. Fortunatly, this was pretty easy to confirm as those switch are made in a way that you can open up their casing pretty efforlessly. Here's how these type of switch look like inside: A quick look inside the switch confirmed my innitial theory. Carefully rebending the think metal sheet should have been enough to make it fonctionnal again but it was so used that it broke in two pieces the second I tried to touch it.  At this point, I started searching online for this particular switch and tought  I might be out of luck with this repair since it seemed pretty hard to locate in small quantity. But I was lucky and found an eBay seller from Hong Kong selling them at the very low price of 3.75$ for a pack of 10 pcs, shipping included. I have no idea how they are even breaking even with that kind of price but they are a real lifesaver and get all my electronic component from them most of the time. I am a bit wary of linking directly to the auction page as I do not want to vouch for a random sellers halfway accross the globe but just search for “Momentary Actuator Mini Micro Switches“ on eBay and you should find it. I took measurement of the broken switch and compared them to the spec of the eBay listing and it seem they were exact replacement for the switch used in the Madcatz R.A.T. 7. Very lucky indeed. All I had to do is wait a few weeks for them to arrive to my doorstep. Once my new switch had arrived, it was a simpel matter of desoldering the old switch and replacing it with a new chinese one. I used my hot air soldering station to de-solder them. I wouldn't recommend that method if you were to work on an important PCB as excess heat can potentionnaly cause damage to the circuit board like warping the board or weaken some of the tinier trace but I rarely have issue with this method. You just have to be careful and patient. I also try to isolate the area I am heating up by covering it's surrounding with one or two layer of Kapton's heat resistant tape. You could also use tin foil if that'd the only thing you have on hand. Otherwise, you can de-solder the regualr way with a solder-sucker and/or de-soldering braid, it is usualy a less aggressive method. Plus, the switch only has 3 pins so it shouldn't really be an issue. Once the new switch was installed, I quickly verified it with the continuity test function of my multimeter and re-assembled the mouse.   Left-click is back to clicking and the mouse work like a new one, I'll now enjoy my first piece of high-end gaming peripheral that I got at a fraction of the price!      Twitter (function(d, s, id) { var js, fjs = d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0]; if (d.getElementById(id)) {return;} js = d.createElement(s); js.id = id; js.src = "//connect.facebook.net/en_GB/all.js#xfbml=1"; fjs.parentNode.insertBefore(js, fjs); }(document, 'script', 'facebook-jssdk'));{lang: 'en-GB'}