Quality mobo companies:
Asus
MSI (Micro Star International)
Abit
DFI High end models (Diamond Flower Int or Inc)
Basically any company that puts some R&D time into their products and uses Rubycon capacitors generally makes good boards.
If your not going to be playing games, there is no need for an SLI enabled board, unless there is an option on that board you want and it happens to be SLI enabled.
I suggest going with an nForce4 Ultra based board, it has good performance and all around good features.
There is no need for a bleeding edge technology motherboard, if fact I'd discourage it for your needs. I'd suggest something a little older, more mature, that has had the BIOS bugs worked out so that shipping models are problem free out of the box. Also the newest models comming out right now are still in tight supply, you'd have to do some searching and waiting.
As for memory, I'd suggest at least 512MB, I recommend 1GB to everyone though, even non-gamers. Especially using Windows XP. The entire Win32 API is a memory hog, since Windows XP can make EFFECTIVE use of 2GB of memory, address 4GB, might as well drop a 1GB in there. Only use a MATCHED pair kit of quality RAM, especially for Dual Channel. It will alleviate quite a few headaches. You'll want PC3200 for sure, that was the CPU and RAM are speed sycnhed, lowering subsystem overhead and latency. Try and avoid filling all your memory slots, the best configuration is using only 2 sticks for Dual Channel. More then that and it increases incompatibility and command timing (1T to 2T), which will effect performance noticeably.
Specific models:
Asus A8N-E - Solid board, good price, a little mature so should be very stable.
Abit AN8 Ultra - Very solid board, I've used Abit for awhile. Been around awhile, well known stable board in my circles.
MSI K8N Neo4 Platinum - Very solid board again, good array of options, built several customer systems with this board, never any problems.
DFI - No models to recommend, they used to be third-tier garbage OEM direct stuff, bit in the last few years they've been making better stuff, trying to make their name better. I've heard several good reviews of their higher end models.