Binding: Digital
Label: Syngress
Manufacturer: Syngress
Number Of Pages: 512
Publication Date: 2004-09-23
Publisher: Syngress
Studio: Syngress

How to Cheat at Managing Windows Small Business Server 2003 deals only with the vital, and will be a huge relief to the hundreds of thousands of managers who probably never imagined they would be managing the operating system equivalent of the Space Shuttle.

* The "80/20" Rule applied to managing a Windows Small Business Server 2003 network. Concise coverage, with ready-to-use solutions, of the most commonly encountered W2K3 Server tasks and problems.
* Written for the non-MCSE, with little technical training, who is responsible for running a small to medium sized network.
* Microsoft has announced it will no longer support Windows NT 4 products, effective Dec. 31, 2004. Millions of small businesses that did not upgrade to Windows Server 2000 will choose to upgrade directly to Windows Server 2003, and this will be a timely book.

Customer Rating:
Summary: Teaches you how to run the setup wizard
Comment: Since the wizard is pretty straight forward the book wasn't much use. I would have liked more discussion of when to use the default and when to customize.

The book advises a minimum 8 gb system drive. Even with Exchange et al on another partition the updates eat up most of the 8 gb quickly causing performance problems. I suggest 14-16 gb wth hard drives so cheap and the time wasted if you have to repartition.

Another place the book recommends the hard drive be at least 2 gb. That may be the minimum per MS but the author should provide realistic minimums.

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Customer Rating:
Summary: Great
Comment: This book is great for those that only work on small business server on occasion. I refer to it every few weeks. a great reference.

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Customer Rating:
Summary: Fine if you don't run into any problems - but that is an unlikely scenario
Comment: This book is fine for an overview of the features included in SBS but, if you need to set it up, this would not be a book that I would recommend. In fact, I wish I could get my money back.

The author approaches the set-up as if it were almost an out-of-the-box program and does not address any of the potentially major problems that can crop up. - And a lot do - just check out the TechNet newsgroup for SBS on Microsoft's website - http://www.microsoft.com/WindowsServer2003/sbs/community/newsgroups/dgbrowser/en-us/default.mspx?dg=microsoft.public.windows.server.sbs

The main problem with this book is that so many things can go wrong with SBS and she has only 6 pages on troubleshooting, and it is totally basic - which she admits by naming the chapter 'Troubleshooting Basics' - but what about troubleshooting is ever basic and where is the 'Advanced Troubleshooting' chapter???

Plus, there is no section in this book on troubleshooting the set-up process.

She writes for troubleshooting: "'Repeatedly ask why?'; 'Ask, 'what just changed?'; 'Cut the problem in half'; 'look for a simple solution'; 'gather evidence', 'write things down' etc. -

What? Have none of us gone through a basic science class! What would have been helpful would have been if she went over what CAN go wrong - you know, typical scenarios.

For example, critical elements like the fact that you need to register with a third-party provider a second domain name for your local network, etc. are not covered in the book.

Under 'Domain Name Naming Conventions' the author writes:

"Typically, companies separate their Internet presence from their internal network by using a different extension. If your company already has an internet presence (website), you can use the domain name with the .local or .office extension. If you don't already have an Internet presence, you should consider a domain name that is somewhat descriptive of your business..."

What the author forgets to mentions is that, whatever you choose, you have to register it - EVEN IF you already have an internet presence and EVEN IF it is only for the internal network.

She gives this super-basic overview of domain names when the entire functionality of SBS is dependent on the DNS. I would say that most people picking up this book know already that a internet domain name needs to be registered but what some people wouldn't know is that an internal domain name also needs to be registered. More information on setting up an internal network is not there.

She took the easy way out and she does this through most of the book.

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Customer Rating:
Summary: Great resource for SBS
Comment: This is a great resource for anyone who is installing or maintaining Windows SBS. There are a lot of screen shots so you know where you're headed and the information is clear and concise. I didn't want a lot of technical jargon, just a book that could help step me through the setup and installation and help me avoid common mistakes. This job filled the bill and I'd recommend it to anyone who's working with SBS.

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Customer Rating:
Summary: Not much more than dialog boxes and help screens
Comment: With few exceptions, this book simply instructs the reader to accept default prompts and reiterates the choices offered by dialog boxes. I suspect the book has two target audiences: 1) small business owners who don't want to know much about SBS and just get it running, and 2) those who need to get it running but also want to learn about the program. For the first group, I suggest you save the time you would spend reading the book and do whatever it is you do to make money and use it to pay an IT professional to install and configure SBS. For the second group, I suggest you buy another book that explains SBS in greater detail.

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