Rating: 
Summary: Excellent Preparation For Hardware-Anemic Dos/Windows Prep
Review: I gave this book a 4 star rating because it does such a fine job of preparing one for the Hardware or Core Service Technician Exam.The book is well written with many practical "how-to" lessons in sofar as assembling,reassembling,upgrading and troubleshooting a PC.My only complaint in the hardware section is the fact that the author can't seem to make up his mind as to the maximum length a parallel cable is (either 10 or 15 ft.)The most helpful feature that appears throughout the book are numerous "Labs" where one actually performs real procedures on your computer.Just to name a few examples one will find Labs involving:Installing a Device Driver,Changing the CMOS Battery,Preventive Maaintence on the Floppy Disk Drive and many more.These "Labs" really reinforce the ,if you will, "book learning " the author so aptly details and illustrates. The Dos/Windows portion of the book I am afraid could use some extensive revision and additions.Via a number of practice exams I found that my memory of Dos and Windows 3.1 details had faded greatly from years of disuse and I was compelled to purchase a book devoted specifically to Dos/Windows in order to be well prepared for that particular exam.Granted Mr.Gilster does refer numerous times throughout the book to various Dos and Windows concepts ,I am afraid it is too widely dispersed to really prepare one for Dos/Win testing. Definently make this book a part of your preparation materials,but I would not recommend one rely on this book as your sole source of exam study.
Rating: 
Summary: Mixed feelings
Review: I just finished reading this book and took maticulous notes on EVERYTHING in it. I found the book often repeated itself over and over and some of the chapters were organized poorly. There were a few typos / bad information. On top of that I spent about a month reading the Core section of the book (approx 350 pages) and about 2 days reading the Dos / Windows section (approx 40 pages). Whats up with that? I'm not spending $250 unless Im damn sure Im gonna pass the test. I think Im gonna read another book before I even think about scheduling a test date. This book did however stress a lot of important points in and easy to understand langauge. I learned a lot from it. I would say if your a newbie to PCs deffinately check this book out, If you have a lot of experience w/ PCs it can help refresh your memory. In either case I wouldnt recomend using only this book for the test. The included CD was a valuable tool as well but contained a few errors.
Rating: 
Summary: RECOMMENDED EVEN IF YOU DONT TAKE THE TEST
Review: The author does a great job of slicing up a difficult test into easily digestible pieces (chapters). The humor keeps you going and it was a real page turner. I plan on taking the test soon and of course will not blame the author if I do not pass the first time, he can't take the test for you but my friends have all had great success on the test using this book and CD ROM. The chapters on power supply and memory are worth the price of the book alone because they warn you how NOT TO KILL YOURSELF and how not to irreparably damage a computer. Also well worth re-reading are the portions which tell you what not to do and how they will cause either major damage to the computer or cause it to explode. This book will give you greater appreciation for how your computer works, even if you have no intention of taking the test. I look forward to reading other Dummies books by the same author. As a university professor, I deeply admire authors who can deftly explain difficult topics, this is one of those books and one of those authors.
Rating:
Summary: This book delivers!
Review: Yet another testament to this book. I used it as my one and only source for the A+ test and passed it on my first try. A friend of mine spent some serious money at the same time to attend a specialized A+ school and took the test with me. We spent equal time studying for the test. I passed both portions and he bombed the hardware portion of it. We both invested about one month of study, he using his class materials and me using this book. The book is not perfect and has a handful of typos, especially in the practice tests. However, if you study it carefully you should have no problem finding these errors and correcting them. The author is right on target when he states that he streamlined the material to prepare the reader for the actual test. The included CDROM also has some great practice test material worth every penny of the cover price alone. The book is well written and flows easily from one topic to another. The wording is simple and direct and stays within the realm of the average layperson's grasp. By carefully studying this book one should have no problem passing the A+ tests. A minor update correcting typos would help, but the book still delivers as it is. I highly recommend this to anyone serious about trying to gain their A+ certification.
Rating:
Summary: I bought this book in June and it's already OUTDATED!! WAIT!
Review: Since the new adaptive tests are out for the A+ certification, this book is outdated. I'm sure that they are working on to revise it. Until then, DO NOT BUY THIS BOOK. The information is quite adequate and gives more information than what you need for the A+ cert. I feel that in order for the author to make his point, he had to keep on making sure that the reader understood. I DID pass the a+ (core 705 and Dos/Windows 470 [barely passing]}. So if I did pass.. i SHOULD rate this book as 5 stars.. :) dznutz
Rating:
Summary: Very close and gets the cigar!!!
Review: I just took both the new Core and the Windows/Dos adaptive exams and passed them easily. On the adaptive exams you will recieve between 20 and 40 questions, (the numver will vary due to the difficulity of the questions and if you get them right,) and I had 21 questions on both tests. It took me a total of about 15 minutes to take both tests! I used the included CD practice exams and studied the Cramsession guide on A+ from the cramsession web site.
Rating:
Summary: Great book, but answers often contradictory.
Review: I passed the a+ exams on 8/18/00 with the new adaptive testing format using this book, and by taking a class. In my opinion, this book is absolutely great for studying with, I read it once through, reread about 50% of it before the test, then looked at all the instant answers right before the test. The Cheat Sheet is very good, as well. However, some of the answers in the book contradict each other. For instance, four times it is stated that the maximum length of a parallel cable should be 15 feet (even in the final test review in the back of the book!), but at another point in the book it says that some will say 15 feet (*AHEM* THE BOOK IN PREVIOUS CHAPTERS!) but stick with 10 feet f for the test! Well, which is it!?! Also, sometimes on the test sections, the answers are flat wrong, or instead of using check boxes, they used the radio circles indicating only one correct answer rather than multiple correct answers. This is VERY frustrating! Also, the book did not mention anything about hex mode for printers, which was on my test. However, I took a class to supplement the book, so I knew the answer. In conclusion, these errors make up perhaps 1% of all the facts in the book. I must emphasize this book really emphasizes what will be on the test. It does not try to cover everything you could possibly be tested on. Other books will have every little thing you could possibly want to know for the test. This makes it impossible to weigh the importance of certain facts. For instance, you would not know if knowing your memory addresses or IRQ's is more important (by the way, IRQ's are much more important with the exception of memory addresses of the com and lpt ports). I recommend supplementation in conjunction with this book, but you most certainly can pass the test with this book.
Rating:
Summary: I passed the test! If I can, you can ...
Review: This was the best reference I have found to aid in getting certification! I am not easy to self teach, (where the computer is concerned) and yet that is exactly what I was able to do with the assistance of this book.I was very weary in class, up against students half my age, (I am 40)and yet I passed this exam the first time with a 94%! This is easy to read, easy to understand and easy to put into practice. There are books available for ALOT more money and not quite as good. A great value.
Rating:
Summary: Only a Complete Dummie could fail after reading this book
Review: This book covered the test materials as completely as possible. I didn't have any problem passing this test (96%) after reading only this book. My friends recommended it to me. They were right. I'm just starting in this field and found this book easy to understand. Way to go Mr. Gilster. Thanks for writing a book easy enough for any Dummie to understand. Thanks for helping us to pass the A+ Certification test. Anybody who can't pass the A+ Certification test after reading this book did NOT read this book.
Rating:
Summary: Great resource
Review: I found this book to be a great study kit. There was more information than was needed to pass the exam, but I feel that a training kit should prepair you for the exam and the real world. The author was athoritive and entertaining. A great book. I passed the A+ with flying colors in less than 30 mintues (both tests)! I also recommend the A+ Exam Cram as a backup, but isn't really needed with this excelent book.
|
