Customer Reviews

Star Trek The Next Generation Technical Manual

5 star:		(15)
4 star:		(5)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

If you're a trekker, and would just love to know all the information about life aboard the Enterprise you'll love this book. This book coveres Warp Drive, Turbolifts, Bio-beds in the Sickbay, Tricorders, Hull Material and construction, Holodecks, impulse drive engines, phasers, facts about the Utopia Planitia shipyards, and even the system of addressing crew quarters and such. There is so much information here it's great.

The book also has footnotes throughout about different hapenings on the set of ST:TNG. It is well organised with diagrams and plans for many of the parts of the Enterprise. This really shows the planning which is put behind the world of Star Trek, and how they do thier best to make sure the stories fit technical plausability and cohesion.

Although the success of Star Trek's many incarnations -- from the 1966-69 Original Series, the 1979-2002 feature films, and the four television spin-offs -- is due to the humanity of the characters (even the alien ones!), it's the various starships that have taken the captains, crews and, of course, the audience on incredible journeys across the galaxy. After all, where would James T. Kirk be without the USS Enterprise, or Kathryn Janeway without the USS Voyager? For many Star Trek fans, it's the starship that is the true star of the series, with Kirk (or Picard, or Janeway, or Archer) and Co. as the human "supporting cast" that represents the dreamers who want to "boldly go where no one has gone before."

Although dedicated fans and role-playing game designers had written, illustrated, and even published unofficial Technical Journals of Star Trek's primary starships, Rick Sternbach and Michael Okuda's Star Trek: The Next Generation Technical Manual was the first really detailed "owner's manual" to the USS Enterprise (NCC-1701-D) "done by folks who actually work on Star Trek." Published in October 1991 (halfway through The Next Generation's seven-year run) and featuring Gene Roddenberry's last published words in his special introduction, the Technical Manual is the first volume of a trio of "official" Star Trek references that include The Star Trek Chronology: A History of the Future and The Star Trek Encyclopedia.

The Technical Manual's conceit is that it is a 24th Century reference work, perhaps as a Starfleet public relations publication or in-house orientation manual. The tone the authors adopt (with the exception of the "out-of-the-Star-Trek-scenario footnotes, which are insightful and often humorous) is very similar to a NASA shuttle operator's guide, matter-of-fact, dry, and -- of course -- like a technical journal. Starting with "1.0 USS Enterprise Introduction" and ending with "17.0 Conclusion," this 183 page book tells the reader everything he or she wanted to know about a Galaxy-class starship, but was afraid to ask.

Want to know, for instance, about the Enterprise-D's warp drive and the theory of warp propulsion? It's all there in "5.0 Warp Propulsion Systems." Does transporter technology turn you on, as it were? "9.0 Transporter Systems" tells you how and why a transporter works, complete with a three-page list of every detail of the five seconds that elapse between autosequence initiation and the signaling of a successful transport. All of the familiar operations we have seen on the show's many episodes and the Enterprise-D's final appearance in 1994's Star Trek: Generations are explained in "authentic" detail.

The Star Trek: The Next Generation Technical Manual is generously illustrated with ship's blueprints, deck charts, line drawings of equipment, operations panels, readouts, and weapons. There is even a chart showing the five Starships Enterprise with a brief (one paragraph) history of each incarnation of the NCC-1701. (Star Trek fans who purchased this book when it hit the bookstore shelves in October of '91 got their first hint about the plot of Star Trek VI; the entry for the Enterprise-A not only reveals that the starship had once borne the name USS Yorktown and renamed after the Whale Song crisis, it also mentions the Khitomer conference, "which had such a profound impact on the political climate of this part of the galaxy.")

Star Trek fans -- either "old hands" who were Trekkies in the 1960s or "rookies" just catching up to Next Gen on the Spike Channel -- will probably enjoy this book...assuming it is not already on their bookshelves!

Finally, to see how the ship works. That what this book does, it gives a very detailed inslight into the inner workings of the Enterprise-D. It show details of specific trek technology of this massive ship like phasters,impluses engines, etc. I would highly recommand this book. I am greatly satified with the detail and information of this book. Now I wonder when a technical manual of the Enterprise-E will come out.

Authors Mike Okuda and Rick Sternbach, take fans of Star Trek The Next Generation, on a guided tour of the Enterprise D. Everything from weapons systems, transporters, holodecks, and beyond is wonderfully disected and explained. Both men certainly write with authority on the subject serving as technical go to guys throughout most of the series run.

Okuda and Sternbach make this a fun and facinating read. It may be a tech manual, but it's still a light read. It offers plausable theory about "Treknology", however, it still doesn't take itself too serously. Aside from blueprints and design specs, Trek creator Gene Roddenberry penned the book's introduction-it's one of the last things he wrote about Trek, before he passed away in 1991. Series Executive producer Rick Berman provided an afterword.

This 184 page book is must have, for those that enjoyed the adventures of the Enterprise D, and want to gain insight from part of the team responsible for making the Enterprise fly.

The title says it's a technical manual of the Enterprise-D, and that's exactly what it is. This is a pretty cool entry into the Star Trek universe, however. If you're enough of a nerd to be into this kind of stuff like I am, it's worth it.

I read this book a couple years ago and I read every page of it. To know the technical capabilities of Enterprise-D allows you to enjoy the series more. You know what is posible and what is not.

Not in this case... it's worth the money if you're a techie trekkie!

This is actually what got me watching Star Trek: The Next Generation in the first place. I was comparing Star Trek space vessels to Star Wars space vessels, when I suddenly found myself in need of blueprints and technical readouts for the USS Enterprise D. This book gives a detailed description of some of the major components found on board the Enterprise, and displays the previous Enterprises. I strongly recommend this book to anyone who loves Star Trek.

This is my favorite reference book, and I don't want to miss the opportunity to praise it in any respect. At the first glance, there is nothing very spectacular about the black and blue on white page layout with simple line drawings. The fantastic thing about the manual is when it becomes a real companion to the series, that it picks up all conceivable questions and problems - some real-world annotations are in the footnotes. The other way round, the writers for the series seem to have looked up some things here, so the last three seasons of TNG evidently profited from the book.

Rick Sternbach's sense for technical correctness (although he's an artist, not an engineer) and Mike Okuda's view for the details make the STTNG Technical Manual as complete and as detailed as it could be. What I like even more is that it makes sense technically and that technobabble can only be found where common sense or real engineering don't apply. It has been criticised that the book doesn't really explain how warp drive, transporter or phasers work. To be honest, even Sternbach and Okuda don't know that! But seriously, in my view, exactly this is the most important benefit of the book, for what could be the point in explaining the fictional technology on a level where it is impossible to understand (because no complete theory exists) and at the same time easy to disprove (because with some knowledge of real physics one could easily notice that it just wouldn't work)? In other words, the STTNG Technical Manual doesn't impair our ability to suspend disbelief. Furthermore, the book is written like a technical manual for 24th century engineers who operate or service the ship, so I wouldn't expect the very basics to be explained in it anyway.

Summarizing, the STTNG Technical Manual may look like a collection of simple technical drawings, but it is a well-considered guide to a great ship. The book is largely free of errors, the only blatant one being that Rick Sternbach accidentally scaled down the captain's yacht's dimensions to only half of what they should be - nothing compared to all what they got wrong in the DS9 Technical Manual (below). Anyway, for everyone interested in Star Trek technology, the STTNG Technical Manual is a must-have. If you have only the money for one book, this should be it. Buy it!

This is a good book about the venerable Enterprise D, and is quite nicely presented in an authentic "text book" feel, but this kind of book is outdated. I look forward to reading DS9's manual. Admittedly, the book is heavy on technical stuff, most of which is only vaguely connected with real science, and the vast tracts of technobabble are a little ridiculous. Still, from a designer's point of view, this is a book that goes a long way to making the Enterprise seem real, and it makes viewing the show more interesting. If you're interested in how the Enterprise really "works" then this is the book for you. If you like the actual shows, and the production thereof, steer clear. However, as I mentioned, the DS9 tech manual has kind of rendered this one far out of date.