Snapshots Part 1 covers the basics of doing a snapshot regardless of what type of replication is being used. In Part 2 coming up in the next couple weeks I dig a little more into the underlying process - not critical to know but helps dispel the black box syndrome.
This article shows how to initialize a subscriber from a backup in SQL 2005. It's a niche technique, but it can be a very handy technique for all that. Strangely it's not supported via the UI, you have to add the subscription manually and then everything works normally from there. Heres the link: Init From Backup.
Most people 'set it and forget it' when it comes to replication, not realizing that changes to rows on the publisher are applied one row at a time on the subscriber using the system generated procs created on the subscriber. I actually tend to agree with the concept, opting for a vanilla implementation whenever possible! Needing to update or delete a large number of rows is one place where vanilla plus a dab of butterscotch in the form of replicating stored procedure execution can make a big difference in overall time/resource usage.
Here's the link: http://www.sqlservercentral.com/articles/Replication/61332/
