"I thought you had a board, kinda' like the Uno with more RAM & goodies for about $80-ish."
I have that too. You hadn't indicated any need for RTC, RS232, SD/uSD card tho.
No matter how you go '1284, you will need the maniac/github stuff for the 1284 support as the Arduino IDE does not support the 1284 as a 'native' chip yet; only the '168, '328, '1280, and '2560 I believe.