skinbag

I'm in the process of taking prerequisites for the CIS: Systems/Network Administrator associate's degree at my local tech school. I have major questions and little knowledge to start with. I'm planning to get some general intro. books on networks. Any suggestions would be appreciated.
I'm also a Mac user, so I feel like buying a PC laptop and networking with the Mac would be a little informative. How applicable is XP on a home system to a business environment? ( I'll get XP pro.) I can use a windows machine, but feel like I should be familiar with all aspects of the Windows system before I jump into the specialized classes.
Also- how is the interface on servers? From any machine on the network logged in as administator? On the command line? Just wondering. Any info for me to ponder would be appreciated. ( I'm still at least a semester out, and really want to do some prep. work. )