Rating: 
Summary: Comprehensive treatment
Review: This book is a comprehensive treatment of the exciting new technology of Storage Area Networks. The author has demonstrated sufficient regard for the information needs of managers and consultants, has clear illustrations and includes copious details of interest to network technicians.
Rating:
Summary: Packed with information
Review: This book is deceptively small. Its not even a half inch thick but it is non-stop packed with information... Most books with this much information would be at least 3 times as thick. It is an absolute bargain for the amount of information contained within it. In particular, it goes into great amount of detail on Fibre Channel and the protocols that build SANs. The review of SAN manufacturers in the back of the book was especially helpful. I've purchased books on only a subset of what this book covers for 3 times the price.
Rating: 
Summary: Great information, but not complete
Review: This book is excellent for those seeking to learn Fibre Channel SAN technology. This book is incredibly small due to the fact that Tom Clark writes so consisely. Every sentence contains an important piece of information. Tom does a great job of bringing the reader up-to-speed on what Fibre Channel is and why its used to create SAN's. Once the ball is rolling, he also does a great job of explaining the different topologies (point-to-point, FC-AL, and fabric). However, Tom appears to leave a lot of information out of his book. I'm not sure if this was intentional as he gets so detailed when discussing other topics. For example, his explanation of 8b/10b encoding is the best I've found in any book so far. However, his coverage of fabric addressing and flow control was too brief to be of much use. This is a shame in that I'm certain Tom Clark could explain these much better than he did. It would have made the book worth 5 stars. While studying for my SNIA Level-2 exam, I found this book to be extremely useful. I would recommend it to anyone starting to learn Fibre Channel SAN technology.
Rating:
Summary: Great information, but not complete
Review: This book is excellent for those seeking to learn Fibre Channel SAN technology. This book is incredibly small due to the fact that Tom Clark writes so consisely. Every sentence contains an important piece of information. Tom does a great job of bringing the reader up-to-speed on what Fibre Channel is and why its used to create SAN's. Once the ball is rolling, he also does a great job of explaining the different topologies (point-to-point, FC-AL, and fabric). However, Tom appears to leave a lot of information out of his book. I'm not sure if this was intentional as he gets so detailed when discussing other topics. For example, his explanation of 8b/10b encoding is the best I've found in any book so far. However, his coverage of fabric addressing and flow control was too brief to be of much use. This is a shame in that I'm certain Tom Clark could explain these much better than he did. It would have made the book worth 5 stars. While studying for my SNIA Level-2 exam, I found this book to be extremely useful. I would recommend it to anyone starting to learn Fibre Channel SAN technology.
Rating:
Summary: A must if you are or will be designing SAN's.
Review: This book will not make a SAN architect of you. However, if you desire to be or have been pushed into a SAN architect role, this is a sweet, concise text to give you a firm technical foundation on FC-AL and some of the available products at the time of writing. More importantly though, it gives you the knowledge to ask the right questions of SAN product vendors to implement a SAN solution. The first several chapters on FC-AL seem a bit tedious, but the author has nicely shown in later chapters that a the low-level understanding is crucial to proper design of a SAN. Recommend to those who are or will be designing or implementing SAN solutions. Suggest that readers also exhaustively review vendor literature, the few other texts on the subject, and published papers and standards documents for FC-AL and SAN. Almost gave it 5 stars...the price is definately less than the value of the book...but IMHO the text could have provided a bit more "real-world" design examples. OK, 4.5 stars.
Rating:
Summary: A must if you are or will be designing SAN's.
Review: This book will not make a SAN architect of you. However, if you desire to be or have been pushed into a SAN architect role, this is a sweet, concise text to give you a firm technical foundation on FC-AL and some of the available products at the time of writing. More importantly though, it gives you the knowledge to ask the right questions of SAN product vendors to implement a SAN solution. The first several chapters on FC-AL seem a bit tedious, but the author has nicely shown in later chapters that a the low-level understanding is crucial to proper design of a SAN. Recommend to those who are or will be designing or implementing SAN solutions. Suggest that readers also exhaustively review vendor literature, the few other texts on the subject, and published papers and standards documents for FC-AL and SAN. Almost gave it 5 stars...the price is definately less than the value of the book...but IMHO the text could have provided a bit more "real-world" design examples. OK, 4.5 stars.
Rating:
Summary: It's what you need to know
Review: This is a very well written book from someone who knows the subject well and who has had a lot of first hand experience with customer needs and real life applications. This is the real world. The subject is vast and complex, but the author brings across the important information that you need to know. I have tried to delve through fibre channel drafts and standards. They are for the most part not readable to outsiders such as myself. The only problem with any literature on fibre channel is that the industry is evolving so quickly. I am starved for information on the latest developments. I would recommend this book to anyone interested in fibre channel and at the same time would recommend staying away from books that are pre-1999. There is just too much that has happened lately.
Rating:
Summary: A great introduction to SAN technology
Review: This is an excellent piece of work covering the basics of SAN design, technology, and architecture. It is a quick read for systems and network architects that need to get up to speed fast on this technology. It is not for the computing novice. You must understand mid-level networking and storage concepts and have experience in them in order to get the benefits of this book.
Rating:
Summary: README.1ST
Review: This is perhaps one of the best introductory books on a technical subject that I have read. The information is well sequenced, and leads you from simple to complex without having to constantly flip back to earlier sections. I recommend this book to anyone needing to learn about fibre channel & SANs, especially before you go on to more detailed material.
Rating:
Summary: README.1ST
Review: This is perhaps one of the best introductory books on a technical subject that I have read. The information is well sequenced, and leads you from simple to complex without having to constantly flip back to earlier sections. I recommend this book to anyone needing to learn about fibre channel & SANs, especially before you go on to more detailed material.
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