Questions about PC I'm building for gaming & audio creation

"As for cooling I'd say the Arctic Cooling Freezer 64 would serve you well if you can find it. Very quite but cools well."

That's a processor cooler, right?

Edit: since I noticed there are also things like VGA coolers and what-have-you-not...

 

Okay, I asked my question about the cooling on the shop's forum and someone from the shop recommended me the following possible options:

- Arctic Freezer 64 pro (recommended on this forum)
- Zalman NB47-J Chipset Passive Northbrige
- Zalman VF700-Cu (VGA cooler)

- Possibly replace the case fans with more silent ones (he's recommending a brand called "Papst")

What do you think?

 

As long as you have decent airflow through the case, passive cooling will work fine. I've used AOpen stuff before (mostly motherboards), and they're fine. Not the most flashy, but they've never given me any trouble.

 

Yeah the Freezer 64 will fit a socket 939 board fin. Just make sure you get that model, not the one for Pentiums and s754.
While zalmans are great most people seem to complain that their a bit of a hassle to fit.

 

Stupid question: do I nead a VGA cooler to keep things silent?

Other questions: I forgot to include some USB ports and a Firewire card (are those on the motherboard? Doesn't look like it to me though...)

I'm going to pick:
- Sweex 4 Port USB 2.0 PCI Card
- ASUS Firewire card PCI OEM

I also have a Sounblaster X-FI Xtreme music, so I take it all PCI slots on my motherboard will be occupied with this setup? Could be a problem for the audio capture card I want to get later on

 

Yes while most vga coolers will be admitadly quieter than the stock fans on the cards few are atually loud in the least. Just read the reviews if you're uncertain. Generally it's the big deal Radeon cards that have the loud and huge heatsink/fan combo's.
Any modern motherboard will have 4 or 6 USB ports and more than likely 1 or 2 firewire ports. You definately won't need the USB card but if you have a lot of firewire devices it might be wiser to get a hub of 4 with a lengthy cord that connects to an open USB port so you don't always have to dig back to get to the cable or port.
Since you probaly won't fill up all your slots it shouldn't be a problem. Just try and keep the slot nearest to your video card free for better airflow. It's not vital but every bit helps.