Actually, I checked today and I think my old "80mm" fork is only getting ~60mm of travel. If this isn't typical, I think I'd like to keep it to 80mm max if possible. Do they even make those these days that are suitable for drops and not just light XC duty? I don't really want a fork that's going to be squishing all over the place. I grew up riding ridged of course when I was young, then BMX dirt jumping as a teenager, and don't really like the idea of a big squishy fork. I just want something to smooth out the bumpy single-track. Otherwise, the set-up Dannihilator suggested does sound pretty sweet. The only thing I noticed being that the Komodo says it's 1 1/2" head-tube, and the DJ2 is 1 1/8" steerer. Some sort of adapter available I'm guessing, or is that the space that the headset takes up or something? Still really new to this MTB stuff...

And sorry Dan, $400 is even pushing my budget unfortunately, so $500 is definitely out. I wish I could.