wait a minute...rivets?

hello all,

i was just recently attempting to modify my v7 PS2 and got the motherboard out and the top metal casing off and was surprised to find that the bottom metal casing was held in place by perhaps 5-9 small golden rivets. They appear to simply be held in screw holes but a fair amount of prying (with due caution, of course) has not yielded the bottom casing. None of the disassembly guides i've found have touched upon this, apparently meaning that once the top metal plate is off the bottom should be self-explanatory.

Has anyone else run into this? Is this something brand new sony is doing? Or am i just not pulling hard enough?

any help or advice would be greatly appreciated.

err... from what it sounds lie... those rivets hold screws you need to take out... ie you're looking at it upside down...