The improvements go far beyond the updated material: they also include an all-new approach that examines the TCP/IP protocol stack from the top down, beginning with the applications you may already understand and only then moving deeper to the protocols that make these applications possible. You also get a helpful overview of the "life" of an Internet packet, covering all its movements from inception to final disposition.
If you're looking for nothing more than information on the protocols comprising TCP/IP networking, there are plenty of books to choose from. If you want to understand TCP/IP networking - why the protocols do what they do, how they allow applications to be extended, and how changes in the environment necessitate changes to the protocols—there's only the one you hold in your hands.
Pete Loshin writes and consults about Internet protocols and open source network technologies. Formerly on staff at BYTE Magazine, Information Security Magazine and other publications, his work appears regularly in leading trade publications and websites including CPU, Computerworld, PC Magazine, EarthWeb, Internet.com, and CNN.Pete Loshin, Independent Consultant