Thanks for the reply. I do believe I will be mostly 'just taking it easy on normal trails' but who knows down the line. Good point about the upgradability of both bikes. That's what I was initially thinking of the Marin, that if I'm just going to be riding around it is probably good enough and if I ever really get into it then I could just buy a decent fork and slap it in there. Good to know about the Tokul's upgrade difficulty. Is the Suntour XCR fork that bad? That is one area where I know nothing. A Kona Kahuna came up on CL that looks good but I don't think I'm quite ready to buy just yet.