if your trying to save money and live ing the bay, best bet is move to the east bay or the north bay. Then you still get eaten alive from the expensive gas and 4 dollar bridge tolls.
Mountain view is alright, the downtown area has a couple of cool spots to eat adn walk around and stuff, not a ton of action but its close enough to san jose and san fran, its basically right in the middle.
San Fran is just way too expensive for most normal people to live comfortably for my taste. If you have high paying jobs you might be ok but if you ahve a wife and 2 kids your gonna want a 3 br at least and thats gonna cost you at least 2000 a month in SF probably more. My family left the west bay because they tried to raise the RENT to 2500 a month for a 3 br duplex. This was in Redwood City which is like 10 mi from mountain view. Frisco is probably like 2800 a month for a 3 br. Plus you gotta add on the fact that if you live in frisco you are gonna have to break bread every time you park your vehicle or you are paying for cabs and trains.
Thats why I live in Arizona right now