Rating: 
Summary: Good refresher for the experienced, but now out of date
Review: If you have some experience on the subject matter, this is an excellent refresher book. It is lite and direct without loosing the reader in unnecessary jargon and complexity. If you're a novice, you're going to need more...a lot more. Someone without computer troubleshooting experience is going to find the A+ exam extremely difficult, if not impossible. And this book cannot substitute for real hands-on. CompTIA has changed the A+ test and I don't know how relative this book will be to people taking the new test.
Rating:
Summary: NOT for the novice......
Review: First off, this book doesn't cover the 2001 objectives, so it's technically obsolete. The Core portion hasn't changed much, so it's still useful in that regard. This book was >okay< if you're already familiar with most of the content. Had a number of typos in both the book, and CD test questions. I wouldn't recommend it to anyone other than a PC "Wiz" to use to get a feel for the exam. A novice won't learn anything here. The best part of the book is the test CD. I used Marcrafts' book, and also a Coriolis book as my main study guides. The questions on the CD came in handy.
Rating: 
Summary: Dummies leading dummies
Review: I passed my test on experience alone. I owe no thanks to this book and its conflicts and contradictions between the text and the practice tests on the CD ROM. I don't know if all copies are the same, but chapters 17, 18 and 19 were missing from mine.One credit I will give is that I learnt from the "Network Basics" chapter, and was able to quickly troubleshoot my own network problem. I would recommend this book to someone who wants to alleviate the anxiety attacks experienced while removing the cover from his computer, but not to someone planning to write the test.
Rating: 
Summary: Passed on the first try with only this book & experience
Review: The only A+ certification book that I bought was this one. I passed the tests easily on the first try. I do have several years experience and this book helped to reinforce what I know and to clarify or correct what I thought I knew. It should be noted that this book follows the format of the nearly ancient test. The newer test for the 2001 objectives will more than likely be very different and on newer technology not covered in this book. I took the test before 3/30/01, which is the last date the old format will be offered.
Rating:
Summary: Helped this dummy pass both exams . . .
Review: Many 'Dummies' books are too trivial and silly for me; Ron's book is just right. I bought it about 5 months ago, and 2 weeks before the test, finally hunkered down & did some serious studying with it and on-line practice exam sites. Hint - procrastinator that I am, I went ahead & scheduled my exams before I was ready, giving myself 2 weeks to 'do or die' - that deadline gave me the push I needed! And that Saturday afternoon I passed both core & DOS/Windows exams (both tests took me 30 min.) However, the book's DOS/Windows section is a bit weak; many of the actual test questions were more in-depth. But as always, don't rely on just one study source, no matter what exam you're prepping for. A+ Cert. for Dummies is an excellent reference; the index is great; the CD included is also excellent (but skip the silly outpost game), and Ron really does hammer home the core hardware stuff. The cartoons are great too - puts it into a real-world perspective. Yes, I found a few errors; as in low-level formatting a hard drive - it does NOT ruin your disk as he claims, I've done it numerous times. But the major, important stuff is all there. I think this book is worth it's price as a reference, if nothing else. Cuts to the bone, and I have it sitting by me, right now, dog-eared, highlighted, and much-appreciated. Thanks, Ron!
Rating: 
Summary: gets you half way there
Review: This book is extremely informative when dealing with the core portion of the test. It does have mistakes, I also used Exam Cram, which is more rounded but the dummies book takes the cake for core. DO NOT use this for the DOS Windows portion. This thing doesn't even dedicate more than 3 chapters to it if that. Great for 1/2 the picture. I passed the core, failed the windows, restudied the exam cram for windows, passed. nuff said.
Rating:
Summary: Best book there is for A+ Hardware exam and decent for...
Review: the Operating Systems exam. Be sure to get the updated edition for the new A+ exams that CompTIA released this year (2001).
Rating:
Summary: want to pass.. use this book.
Review: I just finished reading the entire book and taking as well as passing the A+ core exams, the tests are now adaptive which is a little less intimidating that the orginal 65 question tests. This was the only study material I used, there is often to much info in the book about the hardware core exam, than was needed for the test but if you want to learn about computers this book is wonderful. The windows, dos section is limited and is probably not enough to get you thru the test without using some real world experience or another type of study material. Over all I learned alot from the book and I could not have passed the tests without it.
Rating:
Summary: Very Easy to Read and Understand!
Review: I really enjoyed this A+ book. It was very easy to read and understand.
Rating:
Summary: The proof is in the pudding.
Review: I went for the test with nothing more than this book and my previous knowledge of the field. It taught me a great deal including "old school" stuff which only 10% of that was on the test. But the saving part of the book is that it covered the recent things as well (which was on the test). Over all, the book is a good book. I got my Certification with this as my only study guide and it did the trick. I do not know what more I could ask for out of it.
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