I have a dawes road bike. It's served me well. But it's cheap, it knows it's cheap, and it doesn't try to hide that. It does it's job and was a GREAT starter road bike. I hope that theme continues with their MTB's. Expect Dawes and Motobecane to be a good starting point, but don't expect them to be a fancy, new, high tech MTB.
When they talk about tire size, those are all labeled wheelsize X width. Typically, 26" rims with 26x2.1 tires are the 'standard' for mountain bikes. But that's all changing. Now there's 29er(700c), 27.5er(650b) and 26er rims with all kinds of different tire widths ranging from 1"-2.5" wide based on their intended use.
Correct me if I'm wrong Jason, but 700c are the same size as 29". I think Mark uses roadie 700c tires on his 29er mtb for street use. Only difference is mountain bikes refer to wheels as 29ers where roadies refer to their wheels as 700c.
OH! and I noticed you referred to a 26" mtb earlier. When you mention a size with the bike, that's typically the frame size. For example, my current roadie is a 56cm bike with 700c wheels. That means my effective top tube is 56cm long and the frame has been proportionately sized to use that measurement as the reference without changing the angles of the geometry. I'm pretty sure you meant a mountain bike with 26" wheels, but just want to make sure you don't sound funny at a bike shop asking for a 26" frame
That would be a huge bike.