[.ca] A+ Exams Guide (Exam 220-301)(Exam 220-302) (ISBN 1584503076)

Not all That!:
This was the 3rd Book I completed in preperation for the A+ exams. I took and passed in April 2004. This book has a lot of great information combined with test questions. The CD provided is another rendition of the exact same questions that are in the end of each chapter. Useless. As far as the needed information required to pass the exam. This book won't do it. You really need a good understanding of Networking, Wireless, Fiber Optic, NT 4.0, 2000 and XP. Unless you are currently in a job utilizing this info everyday, hands on will be the best training I could recommend. During the test I encountered quite a few questions that I personnaly never came across in any of the 3 books I read. The 3 that I read were the top choices at the time. The test encompasses a wide variety of info, OS's, peripherals etc... 1 book will not give you enough in depth detail you need to pass this exam. I was brand-new to the industry as of 2001. Never touched a PC. Began studying on and off for a year and a half then the objectives changed, requiring me to purchase more books. Mike Meyers A+ second Edition was the first book. then Exam Cram by Sybex was the second and A+ Exams Guide the 3rd. Those combined with multiple PC builds, experimenting on different OS's and supplemental (periodicals, magazines)readings got me by. Good Luck!

Is someone padding the reviews?:
If you look through the 10 reviews (at the time I am writing this) you will notice that three of them were authored by "A Reader from The Hamptons". The reviews read like they were written by the same person and it makes you wonder if Mr. Crayton (or his mom) lives in the Hamptons! I do own a copy of the previous version of this book, which was entitled "A+ Adaptive Exams". That book was very brief when it came to tutorial material, but the book was praised by reviewers as having practice questions that were a lot closer to the ones from the real exams than appear in most books brought to market. I haven't followed through on taking the exam yet, so I can't verify that personally. In any case, the phony reviews make me a little hesitant about the book at this time. The book may be an excellent resource, but the phony reviews have slowed down this "Reader from NYC" in purchasing one particular "Certification Book From The Hamptons".

Haste makes waste:
I purchased this book because, at the time, it was the only one I could find covering the recent CompTIA A+ test revisions. Sadly, the editors seemed in such a rush to get this out to print that they missed several detrimental mistakes and typos in the book AND on the CD. I find this to be inexcusable, ESPECIALLY since it has been out for several months and no errata has been presented by the publisher. Choose this book at your own risk!!

Got A+ Certify with this book !:
This book will help you pass the both exams especially if you are new to the A+ exam although the info is not very detailed,if you are trying to aim for higher score or more understanding of how things works, I would suggest you aim for something else like the "A+ All in One", which it cover much more details than any others that I have seen.

Good but not enough:
I just took and barely passed my A+ Hardware exam. This was one of the 2 books I read in preparation \othe other was the A+ ExamCram2 Practice Questions and it had similar shortcomings\c. Maybe it's true that no single book can be comprehensive. I found this book to be informative but not closely reflective of the test itself. This book will help you pass but that's it. I agree with a previous reviewer - if you want to score really high, you'll need some hands-on experience. If anyone else can recommend a more comprehensive book than this please do so - I have yet to take the software exam. For now I'll be checking out certification websites.