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Rating: 
Summary: Complex Physics Simplified
Review: Do not be fooled by those who declare that there are errors in this book. I have worked through many Schaum's books and am yet to find an error; however, because of the extreme complexity of some physics problems, it may seem that there are errors in the text. Every time this happens, I get really technical and eventually find the solution to match the solution given in the book exactly. The Schaum's series is very easy to read and understand, but a certain amount of patience is required.
Rating:
Summary: Awesome Book for all the non Eggheads that need Physics ...
Review: I'm just a regular guy, rather than a physics genius. This book was just another in my huge stack of preparatory books that I'm using to get ready for my ph.d. qualifier.
Yes, this book is a bit too elementary for use on most qualifiers, but Browne has done what nobody else has done, he has taken all of the most important areas of mechanics, e&m, optics, thermo, quantum and relativity and present the material in an easy-to-understand way. The amazing thing though, is that he has managed to make a simple book but still explain the important areas of advanced physics. You won't find a derivation of -- for instance -- the Maxwell Eelectromagnetic wave equation and Poynting Vector, but the equations are in there, and he shows you how to use them.
I can go through my more advanced books and even my simpler guidebooks, and one thing strikes me immediately ... that Browne is in the same class as Griffiths, Speigel and Landau. He has written a book about physics, and he understands physics. The clarity of thought in this book can only come from a seasoned professional with years of experience "behind the pencil." This is not the type of book that is written by a brash young physicist that needs to show how smart he is, but by a grandpa that really does want to make things easier. Amazingly, he even gives a skeletal outline as to how Schrödinger may have come up with his equation, which is nice ... most other books just say it cannot be derived and leave it at that.
Ironically, I had seen this book back in my undergraduate days, and thought little of it. But now that I have enough knowledge to want the simplicity of physics, rather than just a head full of equations, I see the true value of Browne, he UNDERSTANDS, and helps me understand.
Yes, there are a few minor mistakes in the book, but not as many as other reviewers have said. Most of the time, his "error" is either a very obvious typo or a wrinkle to a problem that looks like an error, but is actually correct.
His problems are all interesting, and almost exclusively applied problems. (It wouldn't hurt to have had a few more mathematical type problems, but that's okay.) He even gives amusing personal stories in the problems to keep things interesting.
So now the book is valuable to me because I already have a head full of equations, and I'm already fogged in and can no longer see the forest, just trees. But Browne gives me the aerial view, and I can see how everything fits together again.
I use this book, I live with this book and I'll probably use it for years. I recommend this book. At about $12 you can't go wrong, it's worth many times more.
Rating: 
Summary: Stupid errors on every third page
Review: It would have been five stars if someone had read the manuscript and checked for absurd errors. You can still use it if you get a kick out of spotting outrageous author errors. But they aren't typos. They're wacko errors. So, if you are not excellent at math and science, you simply cannot use the book. It will sink you into confusion.The only explanation is this: Browne wanted to give one of his sophomore physics students a project, namely to fill in many of the details of the book. The kid peed his pants and did the job with such excitment that he made loads of errors a high school student would spot. Browne didn't bother to read the damn thing to see whether the kid made any errors. No, he put the thing in an envelope and sent it to the publisher, who published it without checking for errors. Stupid. If Browne had spent a single work day correcting the howlers, it would have been five stars. It still has that Schaum's quality to it.
Rating: 
Summary: Marginally useful resource littered with errors.
Review: Sorry, Lena, but there are, in fact, _many_ crucial errors in this text (although equation 4.6 on page 42 is not one of them, like one of the posters stated). Just take a look at page 80, problem 6.1:
(.15)(.60)(2pi*.1)^2 = .035531, not 14
In addition, the .1 should really be 10, unless they meant to type 10 sec/rev, in which case they would have still messed up. If you want a simpler example, just take a look at the page immediately following it.
[(150)(9.8)]/cos(60) = 2940, not 2950.
I don't care how "technical" you get, no matter how many times you repeat these seemingly simplistic mathematic functions, you will never get the answers in the book. (Find a friend or go to your local bookstore to verify the inaccuracy of these problems.) My mom once told me of a class she took where the professor, on the very first day of class, told them that every day a different student would take detailed notes on the lecture and then turn it in to him. At the end of the course, he would have enough notes in order to be able to publish a book on the subject. I can only imagine that the same situation occurred here, except the students decided to intentionally mess up the problems and solutions as a way of getting back at the professor. However, it really doesn't matter, because without an editor, the book was published anyways and the professor makes money. I'm very tempted to make a list of all the errata and send it to the publisher, but then I'd just be doing exactly what he forced his students to do, and I'd probably only make him more money. Hell, maybe I'll try to publish my own book. Anyways, if you're going to get this book, make sure you work through the problems yourself and verify everything with an actual textbook. Sounds counterintuitive? It is. However, I'm giving this book two stars because in order to be able to catch the errors in this book, you'll have to have a pretty good grasp of physics, which is what the book was intended to do. It'd be nice if they did it the intended way, though.
Rating:
Summary: Marginally useful resource littered with errors.
Review: Sorry, Lena, but there are, in fact, _many_ crucial errors in this text (although equation 4.6 on page 42 is not one of them, like one of the posters stated). Just take a look at page 80, problem 6.1:
(.15)(.60)(2pi*.1)^2 = .035531, not 14
In addition, the .1 should really be 10, unless they meant to type 10 sec/rev, in which case they would have still messed up. If you want a simpler example, just take a look at the page immediately following it.
[(150)(9.8)]/cos(60) = 2940, not 2950.
I don't care how "technical" you get, no matter how many times you repeat these seemingly simplistic mathematic functions, you will never get the answers in the book. (Find a friend or go to your local bookstore to verify the inaccuracy of these problems.) My mom once told me of a class she took where the professor, on the very first day of class, told them that every day a different student would take detailed notes on the lecture and then turn it in to him. At the end of the course, he would have enough notes in order to be able to publish a book on the subject. I can only imagine that the same situation occurred here, except the students decided to intentionally mess up the problems and solutions as a way of getting back at the professor. However, it really doesn't matter, because without an editor, the book was published anyways and the professor makes money. I'm very tempted to make a list of all the errata and send it to the publisher, but then I'd just be doing exactly what he forced his students to do, and I'd probably only make him more money. Hell, maybe I'll try to publish my own book. Anyways, if you're going to get this book, make sure you work through the problems yourself and verify everything with an actual textbook. Sounds counterintuitive? It is. However, I'm giving this book two stars because in order to be able to catch the errors in this book, you'll have to have a pretty good grasp of physics, which is what the book was intended to do. It'd be nice if they did it the intended way, though.
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