Most Helpful Customer Reviews
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16 of 19 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Cengel4 or MoranShapiro5? A matter of taste only!, April 7, 2004
To all eng thermo learners: i did an intensive comparison of Cengel4 and MoranShapiro5 whenever on the john. Sonntag6 was out-of-race: book really bad (in comparison to the two in question), so let's not talk about it any further. So the remaining top-sellers, they are *the* most widely-used most popular intro texts (the very first two semesters on thermo for engineering students) available; very comprehensive (~800pages) and extremely modern in didactics, layout, and content presentation. No wonder that they are the two best-sold intro texts. Question: which is better?
Results: Both are 100% equally top choices (and 95% equal in teaching text) and in the end it s only a matter of taste and peripheral preferences. My personal peripheral preference would be the "Which one s the better deal (US $)?". Well, MoranShapiro5 is a little harder to read (it uses one colour only: pics, drawings, and images all in GREEN, aarrgh!) and not as nicely layout as Cengel4. But text is a little more detailed and the examples are much longer, and a bit harder and thus more detailed too! Number of examples seems to be higher too (!?) ("So, if you re not a dummie (=total beginner), go for S/M as text and ref!"). Furthermore, the WileyInternationalEdition comes in HARDCOVER whereas the McGraw-HillInternationEdtion comes in PAPERBACK. Both books feature a student book companion site or online learning center. The Wiley book site has the fantastic "ThermoNet"-website, and instructors will find digitized solutions to all text problems. The McGraw-Hill book site does not offer much neither to the student nor to the instructor. Textwise, Cengel *is* better. Easier to read, grasp, learn, and understand. And apply ("So, the best thermo book for dummies is Cengel!"). VERY VERY nice layout, VERY attractive and fun to work with. An enjoyable reading. A bit more fun than Moran's. But as explained, all in all the better deal would be MoranShapiro5. Moran's text is the more serious one: useful as text *and* reference. Cengel's book-for-dummies is very useful for total beginners and poor learners. Well, if you *now* begin to complain that neither Cengel's nor Moran's book pleases you, then you wont find any other good intro tome ('picture book'). These two intro tomes *are* the best, there are no better on the market. Choose one of the two, or dont buy any intro text on eng thermo! If you dont like these two books because eng thermo is too hard for you, then please have a close look at Octave Levenspiel's intro text "Understanding Engineering Thermo". This might be the best to start with then. For you.
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12 of 14 people found the following review helpful:
2.0 out of 5 stars
Too many words, but lots of examples, November 8, 2004
This book crossed my path three times. First was my undergrad thermo course, as a prescribed text. I thought it was a little wordy but the verbosity did not contribute to my understanding. The more they tried to explain the concepts (e.g., on Kelvin's and Clausius' statements of the second law of thermodynamics), the more confusing they became. Needless to say, I didn't do too well. That, however, was another story.
The second time was in my masters studies, and I was the TA for an undergrad thermo course (go figure). I took some examples and exercises for my students. But it still didn't change my opinion on it. Locating anything on thie text would take forever because one would have to peel through layers of words.
The third time, and (hopefully) the last was in my Ph.D. programme. I was flipping through the pages on the advanced topics (Maxwell's relations, Clapeyron's equation, etc.,etc.). Their treatment were simply too trivial, and, with the lack of depth, I promptly put it back to the shelf.
Moran and Shapiro are, no doubt, authorities on thermodynamics, and I respect them very much as experts in their areas. In their writing, it is quite clear that, they assume understanding can be achieved by loading concepts with words, the more the merrier. In my opinion, if is more effective to go through the major concepts succinctly and formally, and go through their implications in more detail. I think, this book fails utterly it this respect.
On the merit of its extensive collection of examples and exercises, I only recommend this book as supplemental. As anything beyond that, however, the shear amount of diction alone will spell frustration for the novice, and redundance for the adept.
Finally, I think Cengel, and Holman do a much better job presenting the concepts at a beginner's level. For the advanced topics (sans stat. mech. and quantum), I would opt for Callen, and Hatsopoulos and Keenan (if you can get your hands on it), with the latter as a reference. Finally, for statistical and quantum mechanics, I would recommend Carter for a starter, and Atkins (Physical Chemistry) will do very well to fill the holes.
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9 of 10 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Excellent Teaching Tool, September 8, 1999
By A Customer
As a student in Mechanical Engineering I used this book for my BS and MS. This book in conjunction with the included software (Interactive Thermodynamics) provides a great teaching and experimental combination. I was able to extend the level of understanding by modifying parameters and variables to see the interaction between variables.This book challenges you to THINK and UNDERSTAND the concepts presented in each section by progressively increasing the level of complexity and difficulty of the practice problems introduced for each section. A very well thought piece of work.
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