Rating: 
Summary: Great Book
Review: Awsome Book, everything is explained very well, I bought the book last week, read 3 chapters without interruption...Best book for differential equations
Rating: 
Summary: A Good Text, Typos Aside
Review: I am currently using this text for an intro level differential equations course, and I feel that this book is well suited as such. It should be easily acessible to anyone with a basic intro calculus foundation and it is ideal for self-study. On the other hand, this text does contain a noticible number of typos, both in "back-of-the-book" answers and example problems. A potential reader should note that this book is fairly applied in its nature (as the title would indicate--engineers take delight, theoreticians take dismay), so one shouldn't expect more than an introduction to the theory of differential equations (ie. don't expect much proof or mathematical rigour).
Rating:
Summary: Very helpful book.
Review: I don't know why everyone else attacks this book! I used it in a third semester math class at Cornell which was 1/3 vector calc (we used Thomas' Calculus, another great book), 1/3 differential equations, and 1/3 Fourier Series, partial differential equations, boundary value problems. We covered Chapters 1-3, parts of 4 and 6, and all of chapter 9. The book is excellent. The explanations are clear. The example problems are not just "plug and play." The problems at the end of each section are not bad. I learned about oscillations and mechanical vibrations in physics and then learned about them from this book (3.4/3.6)...the difference was amazing. Their derivations made sense, and the characteristic polynomial technique they use is 1000 times simpler than the trial solution method that many introductory physics books on mechanics use. The book's only weak point is the discussion of stability and the phase plan in 6.1. They develop it through a bunch of examples instead of talking about the general theory behind it. But this is a minor problem.
Rating:
Summary: Very Good Book
Review: I don't know why everyone else attacks this book! I used it in a third semester math class at Cornell which was 1/3 vector calc (we used Thomas' Calculus, another great book), 1/3 differential equations, and 1/3 Fourier Series, partial differential equations, boundary value problems. We covered Chapters 1-3, parts of 4 and 6, and all of chapter 9. The book is excellent. The explanations are clear. The example problems are not just "plug and play." The problems at the end of each section are not bad. I learned about oscillations and mechanical vibrations in physics and then learned about them from this book (3.4/3.6)...the difference was amazing. Their derivations made sense, and the characteristic polynomial technique they use is 1000 times simpler than the trial solution method that many introductory physics books on mechanics use. The book's only weak point is the discussion of stability and the phase plan in 6.1. They develop it through a bunch of examples instead of talking about the general theory behind it. But this is a minor problem.
Rating: 
Summary: Professors: Beware!
Review: I had to drop out of the class because of this book. Calculus was always my favorite subject, but this book just made it too confusing. Too many theorems and definitions without any examples. College professors, have mercy on your students and choose another book for your differential equations courses!
Rating:
Summary: Exellent book from which to learn Diff Eqs.
Review: I had to learn Diff Eqs. before the semester started, all alone, and I was able to learn, review the necessary calculus, and apply it in my studies. For the person who has trouble reading "math speak", this is a great book to learn from. This text comes highly recommended from me.
Rating: 
Summary: Basically worthless, not worth the paper it was written on.
Review: I have begun my semester with a rather poor professor at the University of Michigan. In fact she explains many things under her breath, and the only way to get it, is through psychic powers. Therefore I am required to read this drivel on my own and try to understand the topics. Most of the problems have squat to do with the section topics. Additionally, the problems are vague, worded improperly, and essentially devoid of any learing value. I would recommend that you save your money and purchase a decent copy and get this crappy one from the library.
Rating:
Summary: A good differential equations textbook
Review: I think the strength of this textbook is the amount of material it encompasses: this book is used in two separate courses in my school--introduction to DE and engineering analysis. I didn't appreciate the textbook so much until I completed my differential equations course and then looked back at the sections on mechanical vibrations to review for my physics course. I then realized that the explanations and derivations were extremely satisfying, much more than your average introductory physics text. Also, the emphasis on the qualitative aspects of DEs, such as slope fields and phase portraits, aid in the coneptual understanding of the otherwise rigorous computation aspects of the topic. My only complaint is that the proofs could've been done in a more understandable manner.
Rating:
Summary: Very helpful book.
Review: I thought this book was very helpful. Granted, I had a great professor but still, the book works enough examples to get the idea of how to do the problems. That leaves the teacher with the job of explaining the theories.
Whenever the book lacked theory explanation, it gave you a list of sources to research to find extra explanation. I liked it but like I said, I had a gr8 professor, this review might have been different if otherwise. If anyone needs a good Calc 3 book, buy the Howard Anton addition. I had a good theory teaching professor for that class but he VERY RARELY worked examples. This book is very good if you have to learn how to do the work by yourself (if you have a teacher like mine was; he was good for theory but left us alone to learn how to do the calc).
Hope this helped!!
Rating:
Summary: Meteocre level text
Review: I was required to use this book as textbook. It really doesn't help much but if you're the type who doesn't like to sit in during college lectures of a course such as Differential Equations, this is the book for you. It is hard to understand the text for this math book becasue it might ask you to refer to something in the previous chapter. I would definitely go with the first edition of this book. It was much better, and I myself have used the first edition. It is easier to understand. I have not completely read the book, but from what I have read (most of it) I can atleast say that this is not the "best of its kind". Chirag
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