Rating: 
Summary: What a great resource!
Review: As a library administrator, and avid woodworker, I get to see and read a lot of woodworking and shop building books. This is among the best I have ever read. I even purchased a copy of this one for myself. I was really impressed with all of the common-sense advice for day-to-day problems encountered in any workshop. Many of the other workshop books on the market are either too simplistic, or serve only to showcase famous woodworking shops without detail. This book gives all the nitty-gritty that you will need to set up or rework your dream shop. It definitely helped me.
Rating:
Summary: Solving problems before the basement is full of equipment!
Review: I am a beginning cabinetmaking student at a local community and technical college here in Minneapolis, and because I know I have much to learn before setting up my own work space, I decided to do some research on the topic. Setting Up Shop: The Practical Guide to Designing and Building Your Dream Shop by Sandor Nagyszalanczy is a lovely book on the subject. The photos are wonderful, and some of the shops are not so much places of work but an expression of lifestyle! Particularly beautiful, though by no means the most clever, are those pictured on pp. 15, 58-59 and 84-85.On a more practical level, the book deals with important issues that need to be taken into consideration prior to putting a shop together. There were a number of points that had not occurred to me before I read the book, and that despite their fairly obvious nature-like dust control and ceiling height and the effect of hard floors on joints. I already had a good idea of where my first shop will be-my basement--and the book provided me with some of the issues most likely to arise out of my choice of location. Of these noise control, dust control in the presence of forced air heating, ventilation during finishing processes, the limitations placed on movement of materials due to ceiling height, the effect of cement floors on my person, and the scarcity of space for large equipment were important to my situation. The book offers a number of clever suggestions to solve some of these problems, and I look forward to finding others for myself. Some of the designs for shop-made shelves for storage are particularly interesting, especially the pull out style wheeled clamp rack that can be stored out of the way in a narrow otherwise unuseable space. The book makes me feel more prepared for some of the problems that I will face in setting up shop. It raised my awareness of specific issues, so that I can discuss with my instructor how he has solved some of them himself. That way I can deal with likely pitfalls before I have a basement full of equipment!
Rating:
Summary: Practical and diverse source of information
Review: I bought a house with a garage that had been converted to a studio apartment. After a year of trying to make it work as a shop I gave up. I was about to completely gut it and start over (which would be more money than I wanted to spend by a long shot) when I spotted this book. The wide range of shop layouts described and shown in this book completely changed my perspective on the problem. Practical and comprehensive, this book is a gem for those looking to build a woodshop from the ground up or renovate an existing one. I have already put several of the principles in this book to work for me and will spend a fraction of what I would have on the remodeling. Thank you Sandor.
Rating:
Summary: Many practical ideas for the rich and the not-so-rich
Review: I have to disagree with the other reviewers that this book only
has info for folks with cash to burn. There are a lot of great
ideas that can be implemented at all sorts of investment levels.
And a number of the shops they feature are not crazy "dream"
shops -- there are several one-car garage and basement shops that
are quite reasonable for any person who is serious enough about
having a shop that they'd actually go to the trouble of buying
a book about setting that shop up. And I also have to say that
this book is much more practical than "The Workshop Book" in the
Taunton Press Workshop Classics series. While I love the latter,
this book has more information about electrical wiring, shop
lay out, bench ideas, and storage. If you are serious about
setting up your first real shop, this is the book you should have,
period.
Rating: 
Summary: There's good stuff here if you search for it
Review: I just had the final electrical installed in my shop so my shop was just about done when I found this book. Parts of this book that pointed out where I did things correctly, parts of the book point out where I should go from here. I've found that there was some good information here, but I think the best information comes from looking at the pictures of other people's shops. How do they arrange their workbenches in relation to their tool boxes, how do they store their clamps, how do they store their wood, etc. Overall, I think Taunton Press's "The Workshop Book" is a better resource for these kinds of ideas. This book is nice, but The Workshop Book goes into much more detail.
Rating:
Summary: You will use the examples in this book.
Review: I was looking for a book about the shop space itself, and this was right on the money. There one chapter on general tools that one would need, but that's it. The rest is dedicated to preparing a space for a woodshop. There is a lot of attention paid to outbuilding-type 'dream' shops most of us will never have, but electricity, surface treatment, storage, etc. are all still applicable. Every chapter is a reference itself. The table of contents is clear and makes it easy to find what you may be interested in.
Rating:
Summary: Packed with info
Review: I was looking for a book about the shop space itself, and this was right on the money. There one chapter on general tools that one would need, but that's it. The rest is dedicated to preparing a space for a woodshop. There is a lot of attention paid to outbuilding-type 'dream' shops most of us will never have, but electricity, surface treatment, storage, etc. are all still applicable. Every chapter is a reference itself. The table of contents is clear and makes it easy to find what you may be interested in.
Rating:
Summary: A great resource.
Review: I've owned a house for about 8 months now and am only dreaming of owning a shop, so I checked this book out of our local library to begin thinking about possiblities. This book was much better than I thought it would be, and I am considering buying it. Let's face it, no one is going to be able to tell you how to set up a shop. Your situation will be different from everyone else. However, this book will give you a good many ideas and much motivation. It has everything from dream workshops to small shops (even a section on garage workshops, which I liked). It's going to give you an idea where to start and where you want to go. It has everything from the basic tool lists to advanced designs for electrical wiring and dust removal. Using this book as a resource, one could really build a great shop, or get a lot of ideas on how to make your shop better. The only thing it won't do is tell you how to make the money for all those great tools you will want after reading it!
Rating: 
Summary: Info: yes! layout: no!
Review: It is difficult to properly review this book. If one is used to the superb works usually presented by Taunton Press, Setting Up Shop is a disappointment. Not because the information is inadequate; far from it! Sandor presents solutions to problems you wouldn't have thought existed until they jumped up and bit you on the nose. How much insulation should you have in your new shop? How do you keep the cords from wrapping around your legs and dropping you into the whirring tablesaw blade? Did you even know it could happen? It can. Sandor Nagyszalanczy will help you avoid disaster. Unfortunately, I cannot give a full five stars to this book because it's layout is, basically, odd. References to other pages in the book are wrong and you have to hunt before and after to find the chart, reference, picture, etc. you wanted. The text seems to disappear around a photo and reappear on the next page where you wouldn't expect it. Very, very annoying! Still, I learned an enormous amount and so will you. There is golden data hidden here but it is well worth the search.
Rating:
Summary: More "dream" than "practical"
Review: This is a nicely photographed book that is loaded with features. It has several profiles of shops from people you've probably heard of (Sam Maloof, James Krenov, etc.) so if you've ever been curious about the shops of top woodworkers this is a good book. It has some basics about electrical and lighting layout, but not nearly enough about machine placement and fitting the shop to your existing space. I wanted to optimize the use of space in my basement shop (with support pillars in the middle of the space) and didn't get much guidance. Given that most non-pros probably work in the garage or basement, there should have been more dedicated to this kind of space. Still, it's a good volume and probably more useful to someone looking to remodel or build new.
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