Customer Reviews

College Physics

5 star:		(10)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(5)
1 star:		(6)

 

 

I used this text for one semester because I had just been hired, and there was no time to switch to a different one before the beginning of the semester. This is by far the worst introductory physics textbook I've ever used in teaching a course. If a student read this book from cover to cover, and understood everything at the depth at which it was presented, that student would still know almost nothing worthwhile about physics. That's because the book is simply a dolled-up compendium of equations, without any intellectual underpinnings at all. The whole thing is geared to letting students solve trivial plug-in problems, without understanding what they are actually doing or why. The absurd price tag just adds insult to injury.

This book gets bad rap and as much as i thought i'd be here righting a bad review, I find myself agreeing with Mr Nevin's review. This book is actually good.

So anyway, glancing through this book without reading will scare you because everything will look like greek. Read it and it is the best thing. i don't even read everything, mostly the parts where it introduces formulas and i work along the examples. If you're having problems with the examples, because i feel like the author has it broken down to the last bit, then you need an pre-algebra refresher. I got introductory physics as a second language to help me break down this book and to be honest, this book helped me break down the mechanics chapter in the physics as a second language book. I know i read one of the reviews here on amazon where the author wrote that parts of the book has been rewritten so my review only applies to the 8th edition only and not previous editon.

First of all, concepts are very well explained,i take physics online and show up to lecture sometimes to sit in and i primarily study from this book because my instructor moves so fast i don't know what he's doing on the board. Each concept is followed by a worked example, a quick quiz and a question as well as a do it yourself example that's similar to the worked example. The book has tons of examples, i mean worked examples in the book and other examples that require you to do the work and compare your answer to the answer provided. The best part, ALL the answers so far, i'm on chapter 14, are right! No errata, yet. I took a physics course back 2004 that the college dropped and i remember looking at that textbook and not knowing what the author was talking about. This one makes you get the basics. Physics isn't my favorite subject so i'm the type who just needs to know the basics to rock my exam. If you're passionate about physics, you'll love how the author has those little boxes that relate stuff to real life. if you're like me who needs just the basics to get through the MCAT, this book will be perfect. it has a little MCAT study in it that points you to which parts of the chapter and questions to focus on. I found the MCAT study guide very HELPFUL. Turns out, you don't need to know a lot of stuff.

Granted, there are few times i look at an example and go where did he get this (in those cases, i had to look again more closely till i figured out what the author did. I think there is one problem in chapter 12 that i don't know how the author got to one step) but overall, it's a good physics book. I just completed physics 1 and i don't think i coulda had a better textbook. if you need a physics book you can self study out of, this is it. Know your trig and algebra, basically log function.

The text devotes most of its space to problems, and rather little to explanation. The problems are good and appropriate, though on a few occasions they solved problems in a manner that was unnecessarily obtuse. Explanations and background text should be much greater.

I gave this text a 3 star primarily because the end of chapter problems are far too difficult. The text does not adequately prepare one to solve the problems, and the study guide (which seems to be out of print) offers only a smattering of the problems. There is not the progression of easy to hard problems, so they are uniformly hard.

This text is noncalculus based, which may be good or bad depenending on your needs.

There is a good variety of problems, from biology, engineering, etc.

The Holt text seems to offer better problems, though I have not used the text much.

This is a college physics text book. It has a wealth of information and realistic problems and examples that are useful. Unlike many similar texts the support materials and answers in the back are actually correct. In addition I have found it to be one of the few texts at this level that are actually somewhat readable. Walking the fine line between too much information and trivia and not enough content this is a good text.

Well written book, physics is hard and this book helps you to understand it and get through the material. good book!

Many of the topics are presented in a misleading and confusing manner. Doesn't really break ideas down, simply states them and moves on. I would not recommend this book for a person who is not familiar with physics or has not been exposed to it in high school.

I used the previous edition of this text for four years at a small liberal arts university to teach algebra-trig based physics. It wasn't a bad text, certainly not as bad as described here by some reviewers, in fact was one of the more popular ones in use across the country at the time. One asset it had was it's MCAT and biology support - a number of my students were pre-med, or biology majors, and many were engineering tech majors.

In those four years, I received not one complaint about the text from any of the ~200+ students or so who took general physics 1 and 2 from me. No student ever complained on my evaluations about the text. Even when I asked many their opinions about the text directly, all said it was a good text and did the job. (I was rated ~4.65 out of 5 by the students on my evals, though.) I did support the text and course with LAN published PowerPoint shows and homework solutions, as well as exam reviews and practice problems, and used interactive and video content. Also used a student response system which students did not have to pay for, which was really liked by most students.

I think what bothers many students is the math needed to really understand this level of physics and be successful solving physics problems. If your algebra and trig isn't recent or complete, or weak, or you havent had pre-calc, any physics text at this level is bound to be challenging. I also point out that this is not a "conceptual physics" text - it's specifically intended to be primarily a problem solving text, as are virtually all similar texts. If you need a review of concepts you might try the "CK-12 21st Century Physics FlexBook" - FREE Kindle format download.

I stopped using this text when this new edition came out, and the price went above ~$150, and switched to a cheaper text - one available in paperback split editions, which reduced the text price by nearly a third.

I doubt that I would use this text again, though. It's too expensive and in the full volume just weighs too much. Look for good paper-back split editions or e-editions. (I'm just about ready to buy a calculus based physics text for my Kindle Fire - for reference. Probably Wolfson's new "Essential University Physics" complete for just ~$50.)

I am a good student who uses the text heavily to study for a course, but this physics book was just atrocious. It is the worst college textbook that I have ever dealt with in my four years as a neuroscience major. The book explains absolutely nothing. There is no organization. You'd be better following your own intuition on the topics covered in this book that relying on the text itself. It is absolutely unbelievable that this text has made it to an 8th edition and still remained so horrendous.

This is perhaps the WORST textbook I've ever had to deal with. Unorganized, uninformative, impossible to read...You would have to already know the stuff in this book to understand a word of it. A HUGE waste of money, i feel sorry for anybody who is forced to get it.

Was hard to understand. Problems weren't very helpful. I'm a senior in college and this is the worst book I've had to use. I learned more watching videos online.