For most of my direct DB work I use SQuirreL SQL (http://www.squirrelsql.org/) It is a powerful database front end tool that runs across a wide range of databases. It has a rich set of plugins (that I don't take enough advantage of) as well as great out-of-the box functionality. It runs on Mac, Linux, Unix and windows. I find it much more productive than the MS Studio for quick database exploring and running ad-hoc scripts. It is really nice having the same tool no matter what machine and database I have to look at.