I am a fellow snowboarder myself. I buy all my gear from sierrasnowboard.com. This is by far the best snowboard/ski website. They also have a forum section/chat. Right now, the 2010 gear is ~20% off or more. My brother just ordered a board and bindings from sierrasnowboard for $400. Boards nowadays are very similar in tech buy vary in flex/pop. Deciding what board to but depends on what your kid likes to do... does he cruise down the mountain, does he charge down, is he into park, or does he ride in powder? Some good snowboard brands out there are burton, nitro, forum, k2, capita... Just check out ss.com and they will be happy to help you out!

Also, check out the classified section on sierra once you know what board/size to look out for...

 

Once you figure out a brand and board size, hit up Craigslist; there are some real deals to be had on snowboard gear. People (for some insane reason) will buy new gear at the beginning of a season, then sell it at the end of the season. Every year. Get him to use the gear until it's broken to save both of you some coin

 

eBay is good for this as well

 

no sense in buying new top of the line stuff if he isn't 100% sure he's going to persue it, plus he'll probably out grow a setup in a couple of years.


I started off with an old school K2 board and bindings that I bought from a co worker for $75... Rode that for about a year then decided to buy a nicer setup.