Rating: 
Summary: Excellent prep book (... but could use minor revision)
Review: If you read and understand the first 9 chapters, you WILL pass the test. No other prep material is necessary. The writing style is more engaging than Cisco Press publications without sacrificing technical depth.This book does need minor revision, as there are a handful of minor syntactical errors in his IOS command examples. However, the inconsistences should be obvious to any serious test candidate.
Rating: 
Summary: Passed 642-501
Review: My CCNA was about to expire so I decided to take one of the new exams from CCSP track which renews existing CCNA. Initially my goal was to take SEVPN first but this book was the only one that had consistent positive feedback. From my CCNA experience I know that Todd Lammle does good work so I spent two weeks reading this book as well as using pactice exam from testking.com. Last Friday I passed it with a score of 916. Book covers all areas of this exam, however, there were few questions on my exam that weren't covered in my reading. I wouldn't expect any book to give you 100% coverage. Beginning of the book has exam objectives from Cisco's website and their applicable chapters. Useful configuration snapshots as well as complete lab configurations. Overall I am very pleased with this book.
Rating: 
Summary: A fair resource but the book needs more diligent editors
Review: This book has a lot going for it. Lammle and Timm are obviously knowledgeable and generally present information in an easy to understand, well organized fashion. I particularly enjoyed the last chapter on Easy VPNs. Short sweet, easy to understand with lots of good info. I also thought chapter 5 was well written - lots of useful tips on how to use CBAC, which seems like it can be especially helpful in securing a network. I like that the book has practical information as well as what you need to pass the exam. The CD is also worthwhile, providing 2 bonus exams (though the answer to question 19 in the first exam has a glaring error that reflects a disturbing lack of understanding of the difference between symmetric and asymmetric encryption that is fortunately not duplicated in the book), an electronic version of the book and flashcards.
One annoying thing about this book is that each chapter warms up with a page or two of useless fluff. The book is also riddled with easily correctable though sometimes amusing errors. A few errors are listed on Sybex's web site (which is worth checking out before you read the book) but not nearly all of them. The first chapter is the worst and should probably be skipped altogether. In it the book makes some interesting claims - for example, on pg 4 that TCP/IP has operating system weaknesses (a bizarre claim to make about a protocol suite) and that because of NAT, there is absolutely no reason to use real IP addresses (surely debatable). On page 12 the book claims that "ICMP attacks are known as 'The Ping of Death'". Hm, I always thought that was the name of one specific ICMP attack. Silly me. On page 15 the book claims, in rather amusing fashion, that "the latest trend in the attacker game is the smurf attack" (certainly not true even in 2002 when the book was written) and that "Smurf attacks send a Layer 2 (Data Link layer) broadcast" (I'm sure Lammle and Timm are aware that ICMP is a layer 3 protocol). There are simply too many to list. Errors are sadly not confined to the first chapter. On page 310 the book claims that the Easy VPN Client does not support DH1 (I believe they meant the VPN server). This contradicts page 308 and the answers to the review questions. The explanation of IPSEC theory (ch 7) and configuration (ch 8) is convoluted, incomplete and should definitely be covered in at least 3 chapters.
Perhaps there was a last minute rush to get the book published or maybe quality control is slipping a bit at Sybex. In any case, this book is pretty good but it could have been great with a bit more work.
Additional note: I just took the test and passed it using this book and a Boson practice exam. There were at least 5 questions on SDM on the test (if the test focused on anything I would say it was SDM). Router MC was also covered. Neither topic was covered in this book - though the Boson exam had more than enough info on each. Concentrate on simple topics for the test - it doesn't delve into anything in great detail (I imagine that's saved for later in the CCSP process).
Rating:
Summary: enough material to pass the exam
Review: This book is a superb example of didactical excellence.
Although this book misses to include the VPN/Security Management
Solution 2.1 material which is needed for the exam, it does
include enough material for passing the exam. Writing a book
like this was written is just an act of art.
Rating:
Summary: Very Good book
Review: This book was all I really needed to pass the SECUR exam. It is very well written and well worth the money.
Rating:
Summary: old, outdated, and not terribly good
Review: This guide will not allow you to pass the Cisco tests by its self. The book is only good in conjunction with the latest Cisco Press books.
The main problem is that this entire Sybex CCSP series is outdated. Cisco added to their tests and updated their books after these were written. (i am giving them the benefit of the doubt there). These book leave a ton of stuff out. There are also some errors in the questions.
Bottom line is that these books do not stand up by themselves.
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