Rating: 
Summary: A densely written and detailed textbook - not for beginners
Review: At nearly 900 pages you do get value for money.Silberschatz and Galvin have written a hefty textbook which takes both concentration and time to work through. It cannot be read without some basic knowledge of computer systems architecture and is not a 'progressive' book i.e. chapters can be read individually to gain understanding of specialised aspects of OS. Major plus points go to the authors for the detailed explanations of real operating systems in common use. For those wanting general knowledge, try another OS book, maybe Englander's?
Rating: 
Summary: A good first time book
Review: This is a good introductory book on operating systems. I would go so far as to say that this is a better book than the OS book by Milankovic. Dont expect too much from this book, and you should be fine. In fact, it does a good job of going over the entire gamut of the operating systems sphere though not in excruciating detail, for which you need to pick up a more detailed and advanced book. This is an amazing book for starters and undergraduate students. Concise and clear, most of what the author says is decipherable. That is its key advantage, along with it's coverage.
Rating: 
Summary: Great Introduction and Overview of the Concepts of OS Design
Review: I just finished the 3rd year undergraduate course that I used this book for. I found the book to be fairly easy to read and had a ton of information on a vast span of topics related to OS design. the case-studies were also very interesting. My only pick is that there is very little detail included. However the book doesn't claim to be anything more than an overview and much more detail could easily overwhelm a student in an intro course. for this reason, this book is an excellent start, but don't expect to write an OS after finishing it.
Rating: 
Summary: Book Is Terrible--Poorly Written and Not Well Organized
Review: The Book is plagued with several instances of ambiguous and poorly written paragraphs. One example of this appears on page 257. "Another possible solution to the external fragmentation problem is to permit the logical address space of a process to be noncontiguous, thus allowing the process to be allocated physical memory wherever the latter is available." Does the word "latter" refer to "process" or "memory" or "noncontiguous".? It refers to memory but this is still poor english and ambiguous. The author should have ended the sentence with..."wherever physical memory is available." We find examples of this type of ambiguous writing throughout the book. It is amazing how the author Silberschatz could achieve prestigious standing in the profession without being able to write basic english. Computer Science is a new discipline and very probably corrupted to the extent that the best talented individuals in the field are being sideswiped and not reaching the top. Inherently untalented practitioners reach the top on factors other than merit, ( where good english skills--often a indicator of inherent intelligence--is irrevelant.) The fact that many Computer Science Departments use this poorly written and thoroughly confusing book for their operating system course does not reflect well on the Computer Science discipline as a whole. The Computer Science discipline is a new discipline that is clearly in trouble by its inability to relinquish the yoke of favoritism and patronage in lieu of merit and substance. The existence of Silberschatz's "Operating Systems Concepts" proves that point. Perhaps, the only interesting aspect of the book is its cover showing the prehistoric age and aggressive dinosours. Quite frankly, the book is a dinosaur.
Rating:
Summary: A fair book, not great
Review: If you are looking for a discussion of Win98 or Win95 or any modern operating system you won't find it in this book. Most concepts are presented clearly. However the authors prefer to use Pascal which is a real detriment to understanding. This was probably a good book when it was written but it is now seriously outdated.
Rating:
Summary: Clear, but can be more
Review: I recommend the book to the CS students who start to learn about OS and want to learn the basic concepts. It's the desired book of my professor when I take my first OS course. It's clear and u can understand what an OS looks like by reading it. However, it can't tell u y the OS comes like this. Or i should say that it's not detailed enough. If u just want to understand the concepts, it's a great book. But if u want to know more, take it as one of ur reference book and buy another one called: Operating Systems: Internals and Design Principles by William Stallings.
Rating:
Summary: Excellent textbook and introduction to the field
Review: This was the text for an introductory course on operating systems that I took last semester, and I found it one of the better textbooks on any topic in the field. It's well-written and enjoyable to read, and it avoids using unnecessary jargon (and explains any of it that *is* necessary). The earlier chapters touch on topics that are explored later on in more depth. I think this is what led a reviewer below to complain of repetition, but for me it was a positive feature. I also liked the order in which the topics were covered, and the chapters covering actual operating systems (Unix, Linux, Win NT) and tying them into the theoretical material were excellent.
Rating:
Summary: Great book for CS courses!
Review: After reading a portion of this book from a friend in a 300 level CS course, I found that this book explains everything in a way that I can understand it within a reasonable amount of time. Silberschatz and Gavin did a great job with this book. I understand the concepts fully.
Rating: 
Summary: Dry and Bland
Review: I think the book has potential but it is a dry subject. Very boring. If you can make it past the first half of the book it gets better but is still pretty dry. It is definitely not a beginners book and unless you really need to know the internals of an operating system (like those who program the operating system) don't waste your time.
Rating:
Summary: Much better than Tanenbaum's book
Review: I used this book to teach an OS course to computer engineers at a 4-yr university. The course worked out well and the students liked the book. I made the mistake of using Tanenbaum's book as a reference, and got burned _twice_ by blatent errors in his book. The only problem with this book is that it covers some really esoteric subjects (i.e. theoretical deadlock detection algorithms) that never get any practical use. In summary,
* Tanenbaum: wanders a lot, many errors
* Stallings: too dry for most people
* Silberschatz: the best of the bunch !!
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