Oh I was just wondering how bad all that stuff being in there is on the engine, cause problems down the road, or if it really doesn't matter that much. This is my 1st diesel and TDI I've owned.
I was in the EXACT same boat!
I'm pretty certain that the "destroyed the engine from flaked carbon while cleaning intake and EGR" episodes are few and far in between, that most were likely from early attempts at cleaning intakes ON the car.
I totally agree that valves could catch big chunks of crap. If you've got the intake manifold and EGR valve (cooler OK?*) clean then that leaves only the ports, and the ports you can pretty much see what you have (can't see inside the manifold, unless, that is, you have a bore scope). AND, as you can see for your own eyes, the bulk of anything substantial lies right there at the opening and is therefore easy enough to get out of there.
* My cooler (see my pictures) had a fair amount of crap at the junction to the EGR valve. At first I panicked. Then I realized that it's a straight through pipe and that BOTH ends were disconnected (to do the work), so I just scraped that "lip" out and then blew and and vacuumed it.
The performance of my car is likely as good as any similar car that has a squeaky clean head, so I very much doubt that you have to worry about what you're seeing in the head being an impediment to performance. AND, while I have speculated that performance mods "might" increase the odds of dislodging any residual crap I'm pretty sure that there's been plenty of folks out there that have done performance mods with some levels of preexisting intake clogging and have not had things blow up.
Stuff that lines the walls of the ports is pretty much baked on and ain't going anywhere.
Had it on the list to do: had only planned on replacing the door lock control module (did that), but figured I just get the manifold taken care of sooner rather than later (as spring sets in and all my other stuff starts calling my name).