This book actually covers the refit Enterprise 1701 from the first three Star Trek movies (although there is a short section in the back about the Enterprise-A). This book is very detailed, describing the rooms and systems on every deck and providing floor plans for a lot of them. I'm not sure if it's really canonical, but it is very interesting and well thought out.
I'd have to take a closer look at it before providing any nits, but one possible problem lies in the fact that it describes a very sensible ship made to handle practically any situation. That, of course, makes for a boring movie, so we never see a lot of the systems and failsafes this book describes.
The dates for this are at odds with the encyclopedia
Among the "boring-iser" items are that useful technology for opening only small gaps in the shields around the transporter emitters while keeping the rest of the shields UP, to allow for beaming in combat situations.
This is is a GREAT IDEA! Too bad no-one at the starfleet construction yards ever thought of it.
I think that, besides the date errors, TPTB should consider making this book canon, along with all of Todd Guenther's publications from Mastercom Data Center! Even their dates are a little messed up, and some registry numbers are inconsistent with what was shown on screen, the technology and how the various vessel classes relate to each other is more thought out than the current production team has done for the Trek movie era. I will always consider the movie Enterprise an Enterprise class starship, and the Reliant and starships in its class Avenger class.
>>Even though their dates were a little messed up
I'm not sure about making the book canon, as one chapter talks about the discovery of "transwarp" and that the Enterprise-A (the one from ST4) had transwarp engines. I think the official Star Trek website has declared that this book is most certainly NOT canon.
It's still an interesting seam to mine out, though, with very nice diagrams from the Movies era.
Guenther/Mastercom's starship registry numbers not matching what's onscreen has two explanations: (1) their stuff was based upon the old Technical Manual (the one with the dreadnaught, destroyer, transport, space station-like Starfleet Command, etc.), and (2) some of those onscreen registry numbers (such as USS Bozeman's NCC-1941) came about after the Guenther/Mastercom stuff. I was an avid follower of those manuals (still am) and noticed the discrepancies as they came out.
As for Mr. Scott's Guide..., some of the information therein is based upon the FASA role playing game, which was pretty much made up by FASA. Also, a minor nit, Scott's Guide blueprints of the Enterprise bridge fit the set too snugly into the outer shell; there'd be a slight scale problem.
Oh, shucks, I forgot another nit in Scott's Guide... one of the pages shows a photo of a typical Enterprise corridor... upside down!
I've looked, I don't see an upside down photo of a corridor. What page?
Cr, I have this book too! Imupsidedown when I wake up in the morning
I own this book too. I havent seen an upside down corridor in it anywhere. There is a rather poor photo on the page for G Deck that is dark and at a bad angle. But from what I can tell it is right side up. Maybe it depends on the edition or somethign. Though I cant find an edition or revision number on mine.
I know I'm a little late with this but- there seem to be at least 2 versions of this book.
One was about just the refit Enterprise and came out around the time of STIII.
The other includes the info on the Rnterprise-A and came out after STIV(maybe STV).
Many of the nits in this book come from changed premises, not real errors. At the time this book came out,for example--not many dates had been soundly set, what's given here fits with what is said in Space Seed and STII.
As for transwarp-it was the up and coming thing. No one could see it being tossed out(in a throwaway bit a few tears later.
I will admit some things did seem strange(I did not like their idea on the new shields), and the shield bubbles of later shows wrecked the idea for the shield windows for the transporter emiters.
If you take this book as what it was-a look at Star Trek technology as seen when it came out,it's a good book; but if you try to fit it in with later stories-it comes out lacking(I find that I still like picking it up once in a while).