Rating: 
Summary: Is this for students?
Review: This book is reminiscent of most text books, lots of writing and explanations along with lots of pictures and schematics, but it lacks in the mathematical arena. Some of the proofs and equations seem to be plucked from thin air (However, this isn't entirely bad).The only real issue with this book is the lack of a solutions manual. How can a student tell if they are actually learning E&M if they dont know the answers to the problems? How can a student move on to the more advanced subjects E&M if their understanding of the basic material is incomplete or skewed? If Griffiths included a solutions manual, this book would be a great text to learn E&M from. However, it does not include a solutions manual and this adds much more complexity than is needed to an already complex subject.
Rating:
Summary: It would be a mistake to learn from this one
Review: Let me begin by saying that it would be a mistake to learn from Griffiths, for the simple reason he sticks to the coordinate representation without exploiting the bra-ket formalism. This is akin to studying electromagnetism without using vector analysis (or more advanced methods), like early 20th century texts taught it. This alone makes the book a bad purchase. Another point against buying this book is that it's incomplete and elementary. If you're thinking of pursuing a career in physics you will outgrow it VERY quickly and it will become useless. Your money is better spent on more encyclopedic (albeit dry) texts such as Messiah or Cohen-Tannoudji, or on slightly more advanced texts, such as Shankar's excellent (introductory, too!) book. These will serve you in years to come, even through your PhD and afterwards. That being said, I did not find anything particularly bad or good about this book. Griffiths style is nice, but style doesn't sell physics books. There are dozens of books on QM and it seems a bit strange to me that people still keep on writing books on this subject. I did not personally try the problems - you don't buy books for problems, you buy books to learn about physics. If you want problems with solutions, try the excellent and comprehensive "Problems and solutions on quantum mechanics", edited by Lim Yung-kuo -it doesn't cost as much as Griffiths and will be MUCH much more effective for learning problem solving skills! (also there's a 90% chance you'll find your homework problems in there ... ;-))
Rating: 
Summary: Best Physics Textbook Ever!
Review: This book kicks ... I now worship at the alter of Davis Griffiths. His writing of the text gives you an intuitive understanding of the concepts involved. Plus he's hilarious. I highly recommend this textbook for teachers teaching E&M and for students taking E&M, whether or not this is the required book for the class.
Rating:
Summary: An excellent text to learn E and M from
Review: I would actually rate this book closer to 4 and 1/2 stars than five, but it definately deserves higher than 4. With that said, I thought the book was an excellent text. I used this text for two semesters of E and M as a Junior undergraduate physics major, and found it to be well written and well organized. I was able to learn the material without the need of lecture(when needed.) I think that Griffiths is a very readable author. With that, I mean that I did not have to read statements multiple times to find out what he meant. The book flowed and I thought the order that it followed was well suited. I would like to have seen more examples, but overall this is one of the best texts I have come across.
Rating: 
Summary: In-Depth E&M Text
Review: I used this text in an E&M course a few semesters back. Over-
all, I enjoyed the book. There are numerous examples in the
book, and a book can never have too many examples. The problems
are mostly not too bad, and some give interesting results (I did
attempt every one of them up to chapter 6). The only thing
that I did not like much about the book was the introduction
to coordinate transformations. If you want a good introduction
to coordinate transformations in an E&M text, then I will
recommend Paul & Nasars book "Introduction to Electromagnetic
Fields," which uses a mathematical approach to finding the
transformation matrices rather than the "hand-waving" physicists
approach like Griffiths and most other texts use, if they use
anything at all. The Paul & Nasar text is for an Electrical
Engineers E&M course however, and is not "deep" as Griffiths
text. Both texts (like all others I've seen) use vectors in all
situations that require their use. Someday I'd like to see a
text that explicitly uses tensors. (Yes, a tensor of order one
and a vector are not the same thing in most coordinate systems)
Rating: 
Summary: confusing and time-consuming
Review: Although I know this is supposedly THE book for E&M, I find it is lacking in explaining concepts. Problems are just thrown at the student; one does not even know how to approach a problem, let alone actually solve it. I've spent a tremendous amount of time conferring with other students in the course or getting help from my professor than I have spent on actually working the problems.
Rating: 
Summary: no good
Review: His approach is getting you to learn the material *by yourself* by doing the problems. It's a nice idea, but when it ultimately falls flat, nothing is explained to you and you haven't learned a thing. Over two semesters, I've spent close to 10 grueling hours a week working his problems - and in the end it's been a waste of my time.
Rating:
Summary: He is the King
Review: 4 stars for this text because self-students (like myself) have to rely on authors like Mr Griffiths who have the exceptional talent of making a difficult subject *seem* accessable and get you on your way. Having said that, let's not forget that Mr Griffiths understands electrodynamics in the good old 19th century way, when physicists thought Newtonian: in terms of forces in 3-space. Then came Einstein, whose special theory of relativity made physicists think about ED relativistically. SOME physicists, that is, like Landau and Lifshitz, whose book "The classical theory of fields" taught me that electrodynamics is in fact a relativistic subject. And that those hideous Maxwell equations are like the tip of the iceberg. You don't see the whole berg until you look under the waterline, meaning: in 4-space electrodynamics is a "logically connected" subject (as Landau and Lifshitz put it). 3-space electrodynamics is for engineers - and physicists that can't get used to special relativity, which are abundant, if you ask me.
So your goal should be "The classical theory of fields", but until then you may well have fun with The Undisputed King of Dirty Math, David J. Griffiths, God bless him.
Rating:
Summary: Good for reading but not doing
Review: This is a good book if you want to understand the concepts of EM but it's lacking when you actually want to begin doing some problems. None of the answers are supplied in the back of the book. Be prepared to spend a lot of time in your professors office if you're using this book.
Rating:
Summary: Introduction to Electrodynamics
Review: This book gets two stars because it is exceptionally readable. That is its sole redeeming quality. As a textbook it is a failure.
The test of a text is simple--A reasonably intelligent and mathematically prepared person should be able to start at the beginning, read the text, work the examples and then be prepared to solve the problems at the end of the chapter.
This text so ill prepares you for the end problems that if you can solve them, you probably didn't need the text in the first place. The examples given are simple, rudimentary compared to the later solutions asked and principally unconnected. When an example is complex, such vast leaps in mathematical continuity are found that one must question whether the author just looked up the solution somewhere and jotted it down.
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