Familiar worlds - or not

What purpose do we want the setting to play in our SF story?  If you're writing hard SF the setting may be a major character.  The hardships and threats that a planet or space throws up might be the drivers of your tale.  Or, like me, you may want the setting to serve the doings of the characters and only incorporate as much of it as I need to serve their actions.

What we have to produce is useful background.  Our setting needs to be convincing enough for the reader to believe in it, but not so detailed that it becomes overpowering and jolts them out of the story.  Stories are about people doing things, whether those people are humans or aliens, and the setting should support the actions of the characters.

This means making every background detail work.  It means me cutting out my over-description of beautiful dawns and sunsets. And it also means that anything you take the time to lovingly describe in great detail had damned well better be important for your story,

The best SF  doesn't explain now future tech works, it just uses it. Unless, of course, the whole book is structured around the discovery of a new scientific theory that allows the new tech to be created.  But there I'd expect the story of the scientists who discovered the theory or made the prototype machine to be the focus.  These days, science is global and often collaborative between different countries.  Your story might have more tension if it deals with different nations or regions warring over ownership of the tech.  

Seasons must last a season, even if they are a different length from what we're used to.  And if you're labelling them spring, it makes sense for this to be the time when plants burst into new life and many mammals give birth.  

Unfamiliar worlds have to have a thread of internal consistency running through them.  And when you add in the laws of physics and of evolution the chances are that your unfamiliar world has many aspects we can find equivalents for on Earth.