i like the thunderbird, its a good deal but i dont know about that fork. RST grrr (bad memories) 80mm isnt much thats like 3 inches. i checked it out on thier website, which looks like it was designed for a highschool webpage building class. not impressed.

i saw some marz forks on jenson for under 300 bones, i'd be more confident in that.

my lbs is an origin8 dealer, i got my 29er for 400 bucks then bought a good suspension fork, i'll see if i can go that route again, perhaps