Microprocessor Architecture, Programming, and Applications with the 8085 (5th Edition)

Rating:
Summary: Stay away from 5th Edition
Review: BAD BOOK! Not necessarily the material (although as previous reviews have correctly noted, it's no 5 star), but I would like to address the 5th Edition, hard back BOOK published by Prentice-Hall. My book has publishing errors & is poorly constructed. For example, Appendix G, which is solutions to select problems, is apparently the answers for an earlier edition - they make no sense. The book's binding is falling apart. I've had to glue mine up in order to hold it together. Now this is a new, $100+, hard back, text book! I contacted the local Prentice-Hall Rep. for my school 3 weeks ago & still no help. Save your $ on this 5th edition, if you have any other options, until Prentice-Hall corrects their quality control publishing problems (& until they "step up to the plate" & correct problems when they've goofed!).

Rating:
Summary: Stay away from 5th Edition
Review: The book is good but only if you're gonna use it in conjunction with class notes or if you want to read it twice. The content (just the 8085 processor) is good. Everything is well explained. The structuring of the book isn't too great. You'll run into the same thing at three different places and all explained at different details. So it gets irritating at times. Also, the level of detail about the peripheral chips (even for the standard chips - only one has been explained in length, the others just find a mention) isn't too great. Maybe Gaonkar assumed that one would have access to the Intel manuals. I don't know how it works with the other books on this topic, but this book isn't exactly 'the' reference book for somebody working with the 8085, because you'd have to keep using other books or Intel manuals .

Rating:
Summary: exhaustive, but extremely dry
Review: We had this book for our undergraduate course and found it to be extremely disappointing as a learning aid. The author has taken great pains to provide a exahustive coverage, but this book lacks coherence in content and is extremely dry. The book is poorly organized. The author at many places simply puts data sheets and diagrams with no adeaquate explanation. If you have previous background in Microprocessors and want a comprehensive reference this book is for you. If you are a student getting a first introduction to Microprocessors, look somewhere else.

Rating:
Summary: This book is seriously lacking
Review: Why others are giving this book, 5 Stars, I have no idea... Very few books are worth that rating, and this book sure as heck does not even come close. As an introductory text, the book must be evaluated from 2 perspectives (1) Hardware, and (2) programming of the 8085. As a hardware book, I give it 4 stars... It really is a thorough book; but unfortunately it's somewhat disorganized and sometimes lacking in the needed details. Although some might call the book "dry" (is there such a thing as a microprocessor book which isnt???? I've never seen one), the author is fairly clear and has an easy to understand writing style. The MAJOR PROBLEM WITH THIS BOOK... is that the index, is without question, one of the worst indexes ever compiled in any book I have ever read... It's a tragedy... rediculous. When your taking a microprocessor course, oftentimes you want to look little details up; well... 5 times out of 10, you are NOT going to find it in the index.... so basically your going to end up looking through all 800 pages 1-by-1 if you really seek an answer. FROM THE SOFTWARE PERSPECTIVE, this book sucks. The word "suck", is self-descriptive and needs little further clarification. If you are already familiar with assembly language programming.... this won't be a problem for you... If your like most undergrad students who have never had the pleasure of taking ASM, then your professor had better be especially on his/her toes.... because this book itself is absolutely horrible as a teachig aid for ASM. Basically, the problem is simply that the programming content is so "skimpy" and "noncoherent," that I imagine that it would be very difficult to write so much as a 10 line program unless you had another book to consult with... By skimpy... I mean that the book is just plain lacking in content... it's 95 percent hardware, and 5 percent programming.... Second, I say that it is incoherent, because the examples which they give in the book are rediculously non-thorough... The author will say "here is how to sort 5 items in a list"... and might add "this is called a bubble sort".. and then thats it!!! That's absurd!!!! You could write an entire 1000 page book just on sorting.. and thats the best this guy can do.. "this is called a bubble sort"... The author doesn't even bother to explain what bubble sort means, nor does he explain that there are dozens of other sorts you can use which may or may not be more efficient for a given task. Basically, in summation, as a programming book... this sucks royally. If your an undergrad; take an ASM programming course first... or get a seperate book on ASM (it doesnt even have to be an 8085 book.. any ol' ASM book will do, just to explain some of the basics of assembly programming.... because this book is wholley inadequate in that respect.)