In all seriousness, as I mentioned earlier we can use a different type of SD slot that do not use the surface mount pads (instead the thru-hole ones that go through the PCB in a very narrow hole, which can be right on the edge but soldered)
Also, the thickness of the side of the case can be slightly reduced to provide structural integrity for the PCB.
A custom board with custom shape, thickness and components will be guaranteed to fit.
And lastly, the cover and bottom side can be made of a single piece of aluminum wrapped around the card insert side, which can be made thin yet strong, to provide vertical room to fit the entire module in.
Instead of epoxy or superglue (which will spread around and coat everything in plastic), you can use hotglue and, due to its viscous nature, will not seep into small holes like connectors and furthermore do not generate fumes.
To assemble, I would imagine that you would put the PCB in the plastic mid-frame thing, put a dummy SD card in, put hot hotglue on both sides, then chuck the entire thing into the metal casing and extract the dummy SD card.
To disassemble (for recycle), just pull very very hard (or push) to eject the midframe PCB and stuff. The hotglue do not adhere strongly (but rather due to the large surface) and therefore can be removed in chunks. Then the PCB, the frame, the case and the glue can all be recycled.
Very nice work. Look, it even come with a LED. How cool is that?
This card reader if I am not wrong here actually interface via UHS-II. It’s just that the bandwidth is limited elsewhere (controller speed, USB speed, etc).
Depend on the controller, but the socket break out all the UHS-II pins.
