OK, so I'm sure my questions have been answered in spots throughout the forum but i'm not able to find what I am looking for so maybe you all can help me out.
Here's the thing. I have a stock 96 Dodge Neon SOHC w/auto. I blew the engine (I think) on Monday but haven't had a chance to diagnose it, regardless it made some nasty bottom end noise on the freeway and died. My history is with muscle cars (I also have a 70 Camaro with a 383 stroker and a 4 speed). I can't get rid of the Neon cause I owe too much money on it and it's a decent commuter car, besides I kind of know that they are good performers if you put some money in em.

I need some help to understand a couple of things. I found some a good website thanks to some earlier threads. Namely NeonParts.com and I get the impression I can upgrade from the standard 2.0 SOHC to a 2.4 DOHC engine. Is this true? if so how much on average would I pay for a used motor and all the conversion stuff? Also what's involved? I assume the ECM and mounts, cables, etc. are needed.

Second, Can I put in a manual transmission without lots of modifications? It looks like neonparts.com has a conversion kit but you never know how "complete" a lot of conversion kits are until you are ass deep in the change over. Again, approximate costs, parts list, etc.

Or would I be better off just rebuilding my engine and transmission? I found rebuild kits for both (after a buttload of searching). I'd like some more performance since I have to do some heavy duty work to the car anyway so what do you all think? I don't have a ton of money but I obviously have to spend some money even to get a replacement motor (rebuilt 2.0 engines are outrageous in price I think) so I might as well get something out of this whole deal.

I'm anxious to hear what you all think, I have some emails out to places like neonparts.com but don't know how fast or how detailed they will get when they reply.

if ur gonna rebuild ur engine, it costs just as much to get an old 2.4 as to rebuild ur 2.0, so deffinetly do that if you can, it is a whole lot of work, but if you go to neons.org, there are forums that explain the whole process, they also have forums on swapping for a manual tranny too. sry i don't know the actuall costs however