less dust accumulation during PC assembly.

Is that really that much of a problem?

Out of all the things on a PC that I wish were a little safer, that was the last.

The IO shield however, is an evil thing designed to extract my blood…

I'm not sure why they call it neutered, but it is nice getting poked a bit less by the back of the board.

LMAO, I was just digging in a box of parts leftover at my folk's house the other day and got sliced on my fingertip, it felt so sharp I thought for sure somehow a razor blade had gotten in there.

Nope, it was one of those fuckers

IO shields are more or less built into the board these days

Now, case fans on the other hand, are surprisingly sharp

The heatsink on my goddamn CPU fan took a blood sacrifice in my last build. Razor sharp.

Is it still possible to desolder and replace those connectors if needed? Like, did they just grind down the joints?

With a good mounting mechanism that's normally not a problem.

But between Intels classic plastic clips that never go in, and AMD's unbendable steel beam that never wants to clip It's pretty fucking dangerous for both you and the components.

Noctua's mounting system is pretty good. It's a little awkward aiming the screws into position but MUCH easier than almost any other system I've used.