In the UK, the best value budget dSLRs right now are the Sony A200 and Olympus E420:
Entry DSLR
The Nikon D40 and D60 have a serious limitation of no auto-focus screw drive, limiting you to newer and more expensive in-lens motor driven lenses. The older Oly E410 lacks a few tricks, such as wireless flash; the E420 is equipped with this relatively obscure but very cool and useful feature. The Sony has it too - Minolta first introduced it in their film cameras in the 90s, and now Olympus and Pentax/Samsung (not sure about Nikon, and I know Canon requires an additional accessory) include it in their latest models.
I totally agree with BUFF - the most important feature of a camera cannot be quantified by a list of specs, it's how it feels in your hand and how accessible the controls are.