Certification Books

I being a fan of Dummies certifications books, I pick one up for every certification I am going to pursue. I don't just buy the Dummies books though. I buy at least two others. When I see something odd in one I consult the other two, and two out of three wins. The only problem I have with this book is the CD, there are no simulations exam questions on it. Oh, by the way I received a 960 on this test.

I heard about the MCP exams and wanted to do one. I was most familiar with Win 98. The stuff you need to know for the exam is not covered in normal 98 books. I decided to buy this book because of it's positive reviews. I did not know much about networking or the other exam stuff. This book will show you 90% percent of what you need to know. I also used the MS readiness review and the resource kit that comes with the 98 CD. If you do not know much about it start with this one. I passed with a score of 800.

Good book. Very few errors. I read this and used the MS Windows 98 Resource Kit(On the MS Windows 98 CD) as refrence and passed the test first try. The book doesn't cover everything, but along with the Win 98 Res Kit it is all you need and the only book you will have to *buy*.

Like many of you I am self taught. I purchased the Microsoft training manuals, test questions as well as many other books. I found the manuals and the Win98 Resourse kit neccessary but also very technical and confusing at times. The dummy book cleared the fog. I found the test questions to be much like the real exam. Beware though, the test has simulations that the Dummies book does not go into in enough detail for the test questions. Also suggest taking Transcenders. With out this book I would not have passed.

This book is excellent for passing the windows 98 exam. It does have some mistakes and misses steps when setting up policies on a Netware network with Windows 98 workstations. Used a lot of different books to prepare for the exam (Ziff-Davis certication book, Readiness Review, Exam Cram, and others)and I found this book and Transender to be all I needed to pass the exam. Hands on experience is also helpful.

I just passed this test at Microsoft TechEd on my first attempt. The book is well organized and covers all the basics of the exam. My test included 47 questions,35 multiple choice and 12 simulations. The practice exams that are included with the book are horrendous and will not prepare you for the test. Do not rely on them. The book will give you all the basics but you will need to know how to apply them to real world examples. It's not enough to know about snapshots and replication, you'll need to know how to implement them in the most effective Microsoft way. I do recommend this book because it will help prepare you for the test but it's not enough on it's own to pass the test. Good luck.

This is my first Microsoft certification so I wasn't 100% sure how to approach preparing for it. My knee-jerk reaction was to buy a book and do all of my learning from just the book. I found myself reading at night and then during the day (while working) I would try and apply what I had read the previous night to what I was working on that day. Without realizing it I was really just using the book to guide my hands-on learning.

Having said that, the book did a very good job of introducing the exam topics, making note of important topics (HINT: This will probably be on the test), and chapter review questions. I felt the review questions were fairly similar in style to the 70-431 multiple choice question. The practice test's simulation questions are a little buggy, I don't think I could ever answer any of them, but it wasn't that big of deal since I use SSMS everyday. I thought the web content was pretty good, videos, and the second practice test but it is very difficult to navigate to the material. I almost gave up looking for it but somehow I did find it.

I beleive that you could pass the test just by using this book (or any other book) but I think that you should really do the majority of your learning with hands on experience. I do reccomend this book to aid your studying, it worked for me.

I used this book as my main study guide for 70-431. In general, this book provided the understanding needed for the test. I also found the videos to be helpful. My only criticisms are
1)The actual test is considerably more difficult than the practice exam that comes with this book. I took the pratice exam in 30 minutes while the real test took 2 hours.
2)The topic of db backups (through SQL and SSMS) seems to carry more weight on the test than in the book, so be prepared.

As a side note, the technical editor of this book (Darril Gibson) wrote a All-In-One study guide for several SQL exams. It's an excellent book and I used it as a side reference while studying. If you plan to take all three tests, you may want to save your money and just buy the Gibson book.

This book was an invaluable resource. I took the official training recommended by Microsoft (Both classes and an E-Learning course). However, if I had taken the exam with only those I surely would have failed. The Microsoft curriculum was presented in a confusing and stale way that failed to demonstrate how the many "features" of SQL could or should be used in the real world. Carpenter's book provided insight that let me know how a feature worked, and what it was supposed to accomplish. Truly a great resource for the exam (which I passed first try), and also for real world application.

My only criticism of the book is that the editor did a very poor job. There were grammatical and spelling mistakes throughout the book. It appears the editor didn't even run a spell check. Mostly these errors were not a problem, however, at least one practice question and answer directly violated the text and a couple of code examples would never have run. While the CD was helpful (the certcam videos were nice), the E-book was incomplete. It did not have the appendixes - and the table appendix would have been nice to print.

Overall a great book that anyone planning on earning this certification should read. The exam is not easy, but with the help of this book you should pass.

Impressive and exciting. This book is perfectly arranged, documented and skilfully done. I don't usually rate the items five stars.

After taking a semester-long WORD 2000 class at the local community college, I was still nervous about taking the MOUS test. I got this book and faithfully read and worked my way through it. Believe it or not, it cleared up some questions I had never gotten answers to in my class, and also taught me a few shortcuts not presented in class.

And I passed the exam!

After going through this book lesson by lesson, I passed the MOUS Word 2000 Expert exam with flying colors. I like the fact that the lessons in the book get progressively harder as you go through it. The book starts out with opening, saving, and closing documents and works right up through creating and editing Macros. I found the lessons to be moderately interesting, so I wasn't bored as I went through the book.

There are a few mistakes in the book and CD, but not so many mistakes that I would give it a bad review. If you study this book cover to cover, you should have no problems when it comes time to take the exam.

Each skill is presented on two facing pages, with the step-by-step instruction on the left page, and large screen illustrations on the right. Valuable hands-on experience is applied throughout the instruction pages. Then each section has a practice which uses the CD-ROM material for concepts review, skills review, and finally a visual workshop. I am going to purchase the other Coriolis books on Excel, Powerpoint, and Access.

After taking a semester-long WORD 2000 class at the local community college, I was still nervous about taking the MOUS test. I got this book and faithfully read and worked my way through it. Believe it or not, it cleared up some questions I had never gotten answers to in my class, and also taught me a few shortcuts not presented in class.

And I passed the exam!

The book was great in studying for the MOUS. The 'Quick Tips' and the 'Clues to Use' are very helpful. There are typos so be ware. But if you can go through the review without looking back, you can breeze through the exam.

Clarke has an easy way of presenting what is otherwise complicated technical concepts. The book is organized well for the reader to take breaks in the middle of topics.

It does not matter if you are studying for your CNE or CCIE, this book covers the basics of the OSI model and it will get you passing your CNE exams and get your on your way to the more superior Cisco certifications easily.

I got my CNE with this book and I did not use any others. It was not boring like other books I glanced at. This book not only helped me with my CNE and is helping me with my Cisco certifications, but it also helped me review for my A+ certification.

Absolutely wonderful book, great to use for MCSEs wanting to catch up to the knowledge level of a CNE too.

I like the way Clarke organized the relevant topics in passing the CNE exam---adding Humor to a boring concept. This book also contains stuff that would help you even for MCSE. It is really a good source of knowledge for both CNE, CNAs etc. wannabees.

As an MCSE who has been teaching Networking Essentials to systems engineering students I figured that I would breeze through the Novell Networking Technologies course. Whoa! The Novell course goes into substantially more detail than the Microsoft course. I found Clarke's book to be an excellent guide through the maze of material that Novell requires familiarity with. And it was a pleasure to notice that this book seems to be the foundation of many other guides and lectures that I have been exposed to both in Novell and Microsoft curriculums. The author does go overboard on Zen commercials, puzzles, brain teasers, and the like but it is easy to skip over these parts when you have time only to study material you will need for an exam (or in my case, for my next lecture).

It's too bad that Mr. Clarke feels the need to share his thoughts on Zen, include useless quizzes totally unrelated to NetWare or networking, and offer crossword and wordsearch puzzles instead of useful, real-life quizzes and tests. This book was quite complete as of it's publication date, but it is a little out-of-date now. Mr. Clarke also confuses readers with inconsistent terminology at times, once referring to a server as a dedicated 'workstation' rather than a dedicated computer, and a continuing reference to a 'central print queue' rather than just 'print queue.' His constant medical analogies and references are mundane and worthless. The book is written to about an eighth grade level, not an eighth grade reading level, but an eighth grade intelligence level. It's like reading a child's book of NetWare. The book does appear to be organized well and the necessary information is contained in the book. It's just unfortunate that it is buried between and beneath endless pages of medical school wannabe diatribes, 'Zen' garbage, and off-topic quizzes as filler. The book is nearly 1,000 pages, but if the useless garbage were removed, it would be more like 600-700 pages. It's truly too bad because Mr. James does appear to know NetWare very well. I teach computer courses for a business college that uses this book as a text. It is extremely difficult to teach from this book because of the filler and the lack of useful quizzes and tests in the book. The Clarke Tests on the CD are good, but are filled with stupid sound clips from movies and TV that are of varying volume, some quiet and some quite loud. They are very unprofessionally recorded and very annoying during testing. The tests on the CD included with the New Riders MCSE books are far superior to the Clarke tests, however. The saddest reality is that this is apparently the best book available other than Novell's own training books which are much more expensive and are apparently only available through authorized training centers (with training courses).

This is the perfect self-study tool for the A+ Certification. While I mostly used the "Cram" book (which was more general - better for those who have hands-on experience) I found the Prep book to be absolutely comprehensive. If you do purchase this package, keep in mind that the practice tests are far more difficult & ambiguous than the real test. I definately contribute my success on the test to this study guide. I passed the Core test with an 88% and the Windows/DOS with an 86%

After having passed both A+ test's with this pack as my only study guide i would say it needs some work. Though this book won't be good much longer because of the new test i still wanted to let people know that you should look somewhere else besides just this source. These books missed several key points on the core exam that i can remember, one of them being ESD, i had 3 questions about ESD that were no where in the books ESD section. Another thing was the use of the multimeter which there was little more than a definition of in these books and yet i had 3 questions on them for the test. I would use this and one other completely different source with a lot more practice questions/test's if i had to take the exam again.

I have nothing but praise for Certification Insider and this Exam Prep/Cram in particular. The information was quite thorough and yet easy to understand. I felt quite prepared to take both the Core and Windows exam. The "study alerts" and "tips" were extraordinarily helpful and I passed both exams in the FIRST TRY!

I've been into computers for about a year and these were my first choice when getting ready for the A+ exam. I read through the prep book once and skimmed the exam cram and had no problems with the exams. I recommend these to anyone wanting to get A+ certified

Once again Coriolis has proven itself a leader in computer book and certification preparation material. Combing the popular A+ Exam Cram and A+ Exam Prep book in one package was a stroke of genius. Leave it to Coriolis to set the standard.

The 460 plus page Exam Cram book is packed with the essentials for making sure you have the right material to study in order to pass the difficult A+ Exam. They give you an abundance of questions and the "Need to Know" section will help you find the resources to study from.

Add to that the over 1000 pages of the Exam Prep book and you have the perfect combination. The Exam Prep book is teeming with diagrams, figures, picture, tables and more. This integrated with questions, reviews and projects makes this book a sure fire winner.

Coriolis gives you a cd with 2 practice exams along with the answers to the review questions in the Exam Prep book. Coriolis is certainly ahead of the pack when it comes to knowing what people nee to pass the exam and this package is just another example!

I got this book after I read study guides to practice. First I got only 50% right and then after Rita's explanations and more studying I got them 80% right. The questions on the exam were easier than in Rita's so if you understand the logic behind her answers it is very helpful.

I was pleased to see my product arrived on time and in better condition than I imagined. I saved about 20% too!

It's a good way to study in everywhere. All of its questions are in the PMFASTrack, but it isn't a disadvantage, because it allows to memorize better.

This book has come highly recommended as, if you can acheive 85% or more on these exam questions you will pass the PMP, according to my tutors.

Don't waste your money. There are other more useful products out there. I have been very dismayed by the CD (1 year limited use), study cards...these don't help with passing the test. Rita is clever on repackaging material from her original book. Don't fall into the trap!

I purchased this book with the intention of using it as a study guide for SailNY course in Basic Keelboat. The book told me all of the basic information I needed to be ready to intelligently discuss and put into practice basic knowledge about the parts of a boat, the parts of a sail, points of sail, rigging, water safety and rules of the "road."

I recommend this book for any beginning sailor. I was learning on old olympic racing boats with a jib and a mainsail, which were very responsive, so if I could learn what I needed, this book should be appropriate for smaller, slower craft without a doubt.

Geared toward adult new sailors. Not a bad book at all...

This is a compact book with lots of diagrams. Makes for a nice complement to a beginner's keelboat sailing course. More detailed information can be found in the Colgates' "Fast Track to Cruising."

The illustrations in this book really are outstanding; especially compared to the ASA Sailing Fundamentals book. However, the Sailing Fundamentals book is more complete when it comes to regulations and safety. I recommend using both books.

This was a great book to learn from. It made the whole learning to sail process easy.

I recently read the book titled "CCIE Security Practice Labs (CCIE Self-Study)", by Yusuf Hussain Bhaiji. ISBN: 1587051346. This is a great book to use for preparing for the CCIE Security Lab. The main benefit that this book has to offer is that it allows the reader to think outside of the box and configure different Cisco network security devices and features in a way that would otherwise be overlooked.

The book is made up of 7 practice labs which are fairly equal in complexity. As the author states in the book, the labs are relatively straight forward, however it's the detail that one needs to pay attention to in order to help reinforce skills needed to pass the CCIE Security Lab.

Technologies covered in this book include a fairly good portion on general network features such as IP routing protocols (OSPF, EIGRP, BGP and RIP), a few data link layer WAN technologies (ISDN, Frame Relay), Firewall and Intrusion Detection scenarios as well as Authentication, Authorization and Accounting (AAA).

The labs give the reader a mixed bag of scenarios that is designed to challenge not just the configuration of each individual piece of the architecture, but more so the configuration of all features and protocols in a given unlikely scenario.

I like the way in which the book is laid out, because it is designed to allow the reader to really think through how to accomplish a given task by presenting the task in loose pseudo code verbiage.

There are adequate diagrams and screen prints that help map out the objective of each lab. Each lab has a diagram associated with it to help the reader understand visually, what is being accomplished. I think this helps a great deal when mapping the lab to ones memory.

After each lab, which is broken out into sections, the authors gives hints on how to accomplish what has been ask of the reader to build in the lab environment. Again, I like the format, because the answers are not given away fully. Causing the reader to comprehend what they are doing and not just pasting in configurations. However, for those who can't stand digging for answers, and like the answers upfront, a CD-ROM that contains the entire configuration for the lab is included with the book.

Each section of each lab is broken up into tasks and given a weight or points on successful accomplishment of that particular section. According to the word on the street, in the real CCIE Security LAB, if you miss one little detail on a section, you don't get any credit for that section. So you night have the section 75% right and 25% wrong, but you get 0% credit for that section. Which make the CCIE Lab a toughie. That's why it's all about the details, details, details.

CD-ROM contains lab configurations, but they're all contained in one ACSII file. Have to cut and paste out configuration and look for the output for each configuration. Would be better to have the output and configuration in separate files for separate devices. Each lab is kind of jammed into one file. Not pretty for viewing, but effective.

Overall I think this a good book to compliment Cisco Press strong documentation relating to network Security and to help someone achieve the coveted CCIE certification.

I did my CCNP about 2 years ago. Have a big Cisco Lab at home. For long time I was loking for a book that can give me a real feel of actual CCIE labs. I found that in this book. The CD has all the answers for the all 7 labs. Since I have not attempted the exam yet, I don't know how close they are from real exam.

I am a CCNP, CCDP and getting experience at work in Cisco ops. I am slowly pursuing CCIE as time permits.

I have brought this book and any other Cisco titles that will help me practice, practice, etc. So I have not gone thru any or all the labs. In fact I am currently pursuing the CCSP this year and practicing on my router/switches as time permits.

I have also ordered the CCIE practice R/S coming soon, and may pursue that first since I have much more gear. I don't have the PIX, VPN .... which is around another $5-7K but pretty close to what I need for ccie r/s. So why am I giving it 5 stars because other books/workbooks cost many times more than this. So the one interview which gave this a bad rap, he has dug into it and knows but this type of material usually is many times the cost of this book. If you have the gear, want to pursue ccie its worth it.

Otherwise ccie prep classes $2-4k, ccie workbooks $hundreds of dollars, so these Cisco CCIE practices labs, practicals are GREAT as far as I am concerned. Its quite possible and probably true that they contain "errors" but us so called CCIE candidates are supposed to be "experts" or are we just looking for something so we can just follow the cookbook and earn the CCIE title.

I for one want to work thru the configurations and figure it out to become a CCIE. Either I have what it takes or not. If I can't figure it out then I don't deserve the title.

I am a CCNP, CCDP and getting experience at work in Cisco ops. I am slowly pursuing CCIE as time permits.

I have brought this book and any other Cisco titles that will help me practice, practice, etc. So I have not gone thru any or all the labs. In fact I am currently pursuing the CCSP this year and practicing on my router/switches as time permits.

I have also ordered the CCIE practice R/S coming soon, and may pursue that first since I have much more gear. I don't have the PIX, VPN .... which is around another $5-7K but pretty close to what I need for ccie r/s. So why am I giving it 5 stars because other books/workbooks cost many times more than this. So the one interview which gave this a bad rap, he has dug into it and knows but this type of material usually is many times the cost of this book. If you have the gear, want to pursue ccie its worth it.

Otherwise ccie prep classes $2-4k, ccie workbooks $hundreds of dollars, so these Cisco CCIE practices labs, practicals are GREAT as far as I am concerned. Its quite possible and probably true that they contain "errors" but us so called CCIE candidates are supposed to be "experts" or are we just looking for something so we can just follow the cookbook and earn the CCIE title.

I for one want to work thru the configurations and figure it out to become a CCIE. Either I have what it takes or not. If I can't figure it out then I don't deserve the title.

Not being a Cisco expert myself I can't speak much on the technical accuracy of the book. There are some reports out there of mistakes in some of the labs, however CCIE classes and boot camps can cost thousands of dollars and many CCIE workbooks and preparation programs cost well into the hundreds of dollars. For the $50 price of this book I think a few mistakes can be tolerated. In the end, even if there may be a few mistakes, there are seven practice lab scenarios to help you learn and practice configuration and troubleshooting of solutions. The accompanying CDROM contains the solutions to the lab exercises including the configurations and the output of the SHOW commands. In my experience it is possible that a few mistakes here and there may actually make the experience of using a book like this even better. The process of troubleshooting to determine what the mistakes are generally serves to strengthen the information and cement it in your mind.

(...)

Don't buy this edition. Poorly edited. Buy the second printing September 2001. Easier to understand.

This book covers everything you need to know for the Advanced Routing exam. If you are reading anything other than Cisco Press books, I have an obligation to reccomend that you stop where you are and pick up right here. Though, I don't necessarily reccomend bothering with the Advanced Cisco Router Configuration (ACRC). This book is thorough, concise, useful, and a very interesting read. I had difficulty stopping after chapters to even take the brief quizzes (which have worthy questions, mind you). I guarantee that you will seriously enjoy the enrichment this book offers as well as the beneficial rewards waiting at the testing center.

I purchased this book to read use in Cisco Academy semester five as a compainion to the online material,but ended up using the book more often than the online curriculim. The material is extremly well writen and presented,about as good as can be done with material so technical.I think the authors experience in teaching as well as an english degree really shows.There is more than enough material in this book than youll need to pass the BSCN and with the clearity of the writing style youll really understand it.

there are chapters that torture to read through. Let me first say that the Cisco Network Academy text books have been excellent. The advanced routing material is never going to be easy to learn. This Cisco books cover more of the needed material than some of the competing books for the BSCN exam.

My only complaint is that some of it could be made easier to read. If you are not already knowledgable on OSPF and BGP, you will find that you must push through page after page of details of analysis of protocol packets and states before the author puts it into context. If you learn well that way, more power to you. For me, I needed to go to other sources, such as Cisco web site or other text books, to find material that also set up example configurations, so I could visualize and digest the tremendous amount of detail required to understand these protocols.

That said, you still won't go wrong with this book.

The textbooks for the Cisco Networking Academy have been the best studies for the Cisco Certifications. The new CCNP series, semester 5(Routing Exam),from Mark McGregor are the best I have read - and I own the CCNP prep library from Cisco. They are concise, to the point and you feel you have a master network engineer working along side you. You really don't want to put them down....and get the lab companion also. I have already pre-ordered semester 6 books from Amazon!

And not much else. The author tries to pack too much info into a single book. It did work for Lammle for the CCNA study guide. However, CCNP covers a lot more. For a recap of technologies this book is fine. If you are looking for a deeper coverage of routing protocols however, check out "Cisco IOS for IP Routing" by Andrew Colton (ISBN 0972286209). That book explains the mechanics of modern routing protocols, such as RIP, EIGRP, OSPF, IS-IS, and BGP in great detail.

I used this book, along with the Todd Lammle CCNP study guides to pass my exams while attending a CCNP boot camp.

This book is a nicely put together document that helps you cram at the last minute.

This book was helpful, but I found a number of flaws and inconsistencies. I have passed 3 of the 4 required to complete the CCNP. I always start with the Cisco Press books first, and then use this book as a review. Of the three tests I've taken, I've passed all on the first try.

This book is a good way to test your understanding by spotting the statements that are wrong, partially right, or right but misleading. For example, on page 242 VTP is defined as "Virtual Trunk Protocol." Then at the review of terms at the end of the chapter (p269), VTP is defined as "VLAN Trunk Protocol." There are other cases where information is correct, but misleading.

To sum up, this book is useful; but definitely do not use it as your primary study material. If you don't find yourself reading sections more than once because they seem to conflict with what you've read elsewhere, you probably don't have a thorough understanding of the material.

This is excellent for exam review! Keep in mind that this is ONLY a review. In no way is this going to subsitute the full material. I used the Cisco Press books along with this. Perfect combination.

I like the exam notes series of books. I read the MCSE 4.0 and this one for the CCNP 2.0 and liked both. I don't like that Sybex makes it difficult to save their PDF file to your hard drive for easier access. With this one you must have the CDROM in the drive to use the online form of the book. That bugs! The material was good. I did like the electronic flash cards on the CD. They weren't too in depth but they did make you think about specific critical subjects. I thought the routing section was as good as their routing study guide book. 4 Stars.