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Cross-references are trivial and the detailed cross-reference will link you back to the overview.Truly, if you have installed a few Windows operating systems, have built a few home computers and were hoping to learn more of the server side aspects, then this book is not the right book. makes this book feel very dated.In many places the language is tortured and convoluted and I have to read, and re-read a sentence to understand it.
I mistakenly assumed that a "bible" would be comprehensive and informative. Instead I find it to be slow, repetitive and emphasizing the obvious.
I'm pretty disappointed with this book. The installation steps walk through can easily be accomplished by reading the installation dialogs - in fact, I had installed my WHS without reference to this book and nothing was missed or omitted.In the section on building one's own computer, there i sno mention of the one single aspect that makes it hazardous - the lack of Windows Server 2003 drivers on many consumer-oriented components.Discussion of specific products and price points for hard drives, etc.
In fact, it repetitively emphasizes the obvious. I remember that after reading the first 128 pages or so, I still had not leaned anything useful.
(Next time I encounter such a sentence, I will update this review to illustrate my point).The many, many screen shots of the most trivial dialogs does naot aid comprehension, it merely slows the reader down. a good 50% of this book will be wasted on you.
After I had the sever up and running, I read the chapters that pertained to my setup, with others to be read if/when I utilize those functions.Given the layout and functional categorization of the various chapters, this book is very easy to use, reading what you need, and saving other chapters for need.WHS is a product that is quite well done by Microsoft, and this book will help you get the best out of your server. I found this book to be very useful after building my WHS home server. Easy to follow, with good screen shots and step by step instructions. The first several chapters I read straight through, dealing with installation and initial setup. The troubleshooting tips and alternate methods helped when loading the server clients on my other computers (e.g., trouble with the install cd, so used "direct from server" method shown in the book).Later on, I found the index to be very useful in researching topics for things I knew I wanted to do, but didn't know how to do them. My only complaint is that sometimes the type is a bit hard to see in the screen shots (e.g., looking for 1 line in a full shot), but otherwise a very nice book to have in hand.I can't say this is the best book on WHS, but it certainly gets the job done and is a good reference to have on your bookshelf. I certainly prefer a hard copy over on-line help, and the cost was certainly offset by time saved.
While some of the explanations are outdated, this book will get you up and running without breaking the system and your nerves. If you are considering the purchase of a home server (perhaps from HP) or buying Windows Home Server software and building your own server from an extra PC, then do buy this book. It's worth every penny. A word of caution: unless you have written program code, I suggest you stay away from making alterations in the Windows Home Server code. It's a delicate system (but getting less fragile with every update), and you should be aware that one wrong move could have you cursing the devil--and everyone else, too.
The book offers a good intro to the product, decent install and configuration instructions and some hints for adding enhancements. This is the perfect amount of detail for getting WHS up and running and figuring out what to do with it once you do. The only thing I can't comment on is whether it will suffice when things go wrong - as none have - yet. I did find myself wishing that it went into a bit more technical detail on some itesm (being an ex-IT guy), but not too often. If you are considering WHS in your house - and you should be if you have more than one system running, just for the backup features alone - this is a good place to begin.
The book appears to be well organized and has a good index. I have not read it cover to cover, but use it as a reference.
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