• If you're new to all this, I think you might be better off familiarising yourself fully with the tools that come with sql server out of the box first.

    Once you have then you'll know what you don't have and seek out third party tools accordingly.

    As an example, sql sentry plan explorer (free) is a good tool for analysing execution plans but you won't fully appreciate it until you've tried examining an execution plan in management studio first.