You can get these USB powered pads to sit your computer on that pump air into it to help cool it off. They use fans, but the ones I've used are very quiet. Or you could do what one of the members of this forum did (I forget which one)...
As long as you keep it cool, and dont run it at the full 1.7Ghz all the time it's pretty much silent. When you ramp up the speed and it gets hot, all the fans kick on and its not silent anymore but I've heard much much louder laptops...
I had that problem with the keyboard as well. After I took the whole thing apart I realized all I had to do was force in place. So just push firmly on the area that isnt seater properly and it should snap in place.
Well the problem is you never know what brand of chips are in the generic memory modules, so it's very difficult to know if there will be conflicts or not. It's inconsistencies like that which makes generic memory very iffy to...
I've never used generic ram in a laptop, but my experience with desktops is that generic RAM will usually work fine by itself, but is a lot pickier about what it's paired up with than name brand memory.
I agree with deltawalkerl, FireWire (aka i.Link, aka IEEE 1394) is the best way to go when it comes to video. You could get an analog-digital capture device, but most DV (either MiniDV or Digital8) cameras will also pass through analog...