SSI query and problem!

Hello all. I have a question for anyone who has knowledge of ssi (server side include) - I have spent one day repeating the same process over and over again, and quite frankly its getting boring, not to mention time consuming.

I understand ssi is a good method of helping solve the process. So effectively if I have 30 links, i.e partner links, I would not need to change them on every page, only modify the one version, i.e using ssi.

Dreamweaver apparently lets you view the outcome of ssi, which does, except when I look at it in the working window, it looks awful, tables are all over the place and I really get the feeling something is not right. Can anyone help me understand ssi more, and in terms of browser compatibility how does it do?

thanks

Trev