Customer Reviews

BCSN: Building Scalable Cisco Networks (Book/CD-ROM package)

5 star:		(6)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(8)

 

 

I just took and passed this exam with a score of 806. (690 required to pass, on a scale of 1000). I have four years experience with cisco routers.

I found this book very useful for learning several protocols that I have not used in the past. HOWEVER, this was complicated by the fact that there are large number of errors in the book. Most of the errors are in the figures and examples. It is so bad that I finally stopped looking at the examples and did my own example in a test lab. DONT EXPECT TO PASS THIS EXAM WITH ONLY THIS BOOK AS YOUR GUIDE.

That having been said, the authors still manage to get their point across in a fairly short period of time.

This book has so many technical errors it is essentially useless for its intended purpose, as a study aid for the BSCN test. Not only are there many technical errors, but the authors basic sentence structure is sometimes incoherent. I would not recommend this book to anyone. I will be sending it back for a refund!

Want to know how many errors I have found in this book? Let's just choose Chapter 9. (keep in mind I took the course.) I never took the test so I bought the book to brush up on BGP. The author hasn't ever used BGP, otherwise he would have known that the "set communities" command is used in the Router(config-route-map)# command mode and let you know how to configure it. One of the most important objectives 'Route maps' is scattered in other sections requiring it, but there is no chapter or section on how to create them?!? There is two lines of code on creating them. There are over 30 commands used in route maps that you have to know for the exam! Where are they? Both the "match" and "set" commands, there are over 30 of them. The "show ip bgp neighbors" output was copied from the original 1.0 of the Cisco student guide. How do I know this? There where errors in the output that werent fixed yet from the original Cisco student guide and missing two variables. They are the same two missing in the book. The configurations for the labs, if you apply them on a router, the syntaxes are backwords and won't work for a few of the commands. Not only that, there is 140 messages received and sent on the output. With the neighbors configured, the received messages would have been much higher than the sent. The output isn't real! This was a rush job on a book and the most important part is BGP. Someone who knew BGP should have wrote the chapter that covers 50 percent of the exam. I just looked at one chapter and realized all the mistakes. Not only that the commands don't show the syntaxes which you need to know for the exam.

I was excited to finally receive this book since it just came out and I wanted some material specifically focused on the BSCN, but now I'm disappointed. It was clearly rushed from the publisher as it contains typographical errors, wrong answers to review questions, and just plain incorrect information. If you have the book, check out section 3.3.1 where the author mentions that without using 0 and 255 as addresses, there are 253 available hosts. Hellloooo. My advice is to get ahold of the Cisco Press ACRC book (from CCNP v1.0) and use that in conjunction with this if you must. Hopefully, the publisher will come out with an errata soon (it will be lengthy) so people don't learn wrong information. The bottom line is this: if you have other materials, even if they are older, use those until better books come out. Follow Cisco's exam outline and use public documents and specifications. Follows newsgroups (alt.certification.cisco, comp.dcom.sys.cisco).

My one good comment about this book is that the FAQs at the end of chapters are intelligently crafted with some good thoughts and information.

Well it is obvious that I have the newest printing (purchased December 00) Mt. Thomas has obviously taken reader comments to heart and fixed every problem in their errata so the printing I have is excellent. I think that this book is excellent and I look forward to passing my test next month.

Holy lack of proofreading Batman!! I've used dozens of other books to complete the MCSE, CCNA, and a few Solaris certifications. This one is definitely a contender for the most confusing and erroneous. A novice like me should not catch 100+(still on page 268) errors in a book written by a CCIE. This book might well have been proofread by an intelligent monkey. Imagine trying to learn complex topics while coping with misinformation, obvious contradictions, mislabeled diagrams, diagrams that don't pertain to the referring text, incorrect commands, incorrect syntax, etc, etc !! I don't even know what I think I learned is true! It's too bad nobody took the time to read it over before it went to the press. They often do a good job distilling key concepts. I, too, plan to ask for a refund and for part-time job proofreading future works. The errors I've found after only 10 hours of reading easily cost them a few stars. I think the positive reviews here are from folks already fairly knowledgeable with Cisco routing. True, computer and networking books tend to be fraught with errors, due to the greed of publishers trying to be first to press. This one though is definitely a standout.

Good study tool for those with prior knowledge of routing, BGP, and the Cisco IOS. The book has many errors. I found that when I could spot and correct the errors, I had a solid understanding of the material.

Although I passed w/ an 839, this book is, in a word, awful. The errors are unbelievable, the flow is choppy, and the illustrations are difficult to follow - just look at page 469. Quality was definately sacrificed for speed. I can't believe a CCIE put his name on this book. I hope the money was worth the discredit...

Although the book did cover everything on the exam, the mistakes lead to lots of re-reading and frustration.

I was excited to get this book, because it was the first (that I knew of) on the new BSCN exam. However, I very quickly found that its errors were too many and too egregious to be borne. It's as if the publisher never ran it past any editor at all. The book has some limited utility for a person who already knows the material pretty well, and can spot its awful flubs, but for someone learning from scratch - never! It is definitely not worth its steep price.

This book and the Boson practice tests were the only things I used to prepare for the BSCN test and I passed with an 850. I did see some things on the test that I dont remember seeing in this book but not enough to matter. If you are looking for a book that shows you the test before you take it, then this is not the book for you. This book makes you read and comprehend - sorry. There were some errors but I have seen errors in every tech book I've ever read - even Cisco Press books. Get this book along with some practice test and you will be OK. By the time the so-called better books are published, you will have your CCNP.