Communication Systems Engineering (2nd Edition)

Rating:
Summary: not a "first course" book.
Review: The back cover says this book "is primarily intended for use as a text for a first course in communications, or as a comprehensive reference for practicing engineers". I think it accomplished half of that. If you already know the material its a pretty good as a reference. For a first course in communications, its not a good text book. The examples and proofs were poor. There just seemed to be a lot of holes in the material. Even the Prof. teaching the course suggested we look to other text books because of problems with this one.

Rating:
Summary: Authors assume to much.
Review: This book should be for graduate level courses. There are no answers provided for any of the end of chapter problems. In addition the problems contain mostly proofs that are poorly written and assumes the reader/student can put the missing pieces together. Also, the material in the chapters is incomplete for the problems and there are a limited number of examples throughout.

Rating:
Summary: good but lacking
Review: This is a pretty good book. And unlike other have said, it works fine for a first course in communication theory.
The first 7 chapters are very good. However chapter 8 could use some major rewriting. I think it could elborate more on all the major concepts. In chapter 8 the authors progress too fast and don't explain the topics well enough.

Rating:
Summary: The bible of digital communications
Review: This is probably the best textbook around. Well, it is not meant to be read in "21 days" but it provides the hardworking students, all the background to explore the world of digital communications. This book treats almost every topic in communication systems with high accuracy, and this makes it an outstanding introduction for anyone that really wants to know-how communications work.
An all time clacic
Warning:Not for blondes or dummies-contains explicit Math!

Rating:
Summary: bad text book
Review: This may be a good reference book. But it is certainly a bad text book. A lot of theorems are only very shortly stated. The proof is then up to the reader (in the problem section, without solutions). Some of the problems need techniques which are not covered in the text (e.g. problem 7.15, runlength limited codes). The language the authors are using is arrogant and offending ("it can easily be seen..."). Use this book if you already have a strong background in communication theory, but not if you are new to it.

Rating:
Summary: Not for starters
Review: This review is intended for college students taking their first courses in communications , and to departments of electrical engineering who choose this book as a reference for their courses. Ok, this book was the reference suggested for my first courses in analog and digital communications. In the first course (analog communications) the book was not helpful at all, and i think this is the fault of the university, since the book does not stress analog communications. However, in the second course(digital), the teacher's notes were so much easier to grasp than Proakis' text, because for a first course in digital communications, the student is not expected to have a background, and the text assumes that you have a background in digital communications. I also think that the examples were quite poor and lack application perspective. (by the way i got an A on both courses) Therefore this is a book that would be a reference for researchers and teachers better than for students.