Customer Reviews

MCSE Windows 2000 Server Exam Cram (Exam: 70-215)

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

 

 

This is by far the worst Exam Cram Book I have ever purchased. I can say worst, because I would normally rank any book from Exam Cram as either Excellent or very close to that. If you are at all interested in passing Exam 70-215 on your first attempt, then I strongly suggest avoiding this book.

First of all, it's riddled with errors. Additionally, the coverage of key exam topics is far from in-depth. This made the book into more of an annoying companion rather than a critical exam preparation tool. I strongly recommend seeking out other sources of study material to make up for what this book lacks in detail and coverage.

If you study this book, practice (hands-on) using Windows 2000 Professional and some sort of prep tests, you should have no trouble passing this exam. Beware, there are some errors in the book, but if you are experienced (like MS wants you to be before you sit for any Win2k exams) you should be able to pick up on them easily. However, you can get the errata (corrections) from their website, (....)

This book did not meet my expectations. With the realization that an "Exam Cram" cannot go into too much depth, I would use this material as a study outline only. This book will give you 1) an understanding of terminology used in the exam, 2) a checklist of what should be covered, and 3) overall concepts you should be familiar with. However, it did NOT help me with any complex or performance-oriented questions (which made up the majority of the exam). I was grateful to have purchased Transcender materials, as well as the Sybex and Syngress books for this Exam. I did pass, but not with much help from this Exam Cram.
As a side note, I was increasingly annoyed by the considerable amount of spelling, syntax, and data errors I found repeatedly throughout this book.

This book lives up to par with the rest of the Exam Cram series--a good overview of topics, but poor practice exam questions. The book had some errors in it, but overall it provided a good review for me as I prepared for the exam. However, do not make this your only study aid. It alone probably won't get you a passing score. This is a hard exam and more realistic exam questions would have made the book better.

Hmmm well this book is certaintly up there. You cannot say much bad things about the book. The book is packed with screenshots of Windows 2000 and I can read the book without turning on the computer at all. Also, the author has shown clearly the steps in performing an action and a screenshot and explanation for each step. The exam questions in the book are quite good and they summarise the important points that you should have learnt in a chapter. I have not taken the real exam yet, so I cannot tell whether the questions are up to par like the real exam.

All in all, I am a happy customer.

I used an Exam Cram book as my primary reference for studying for exam 70-210, Windows 2000 Professional. When I did that exam, I did quite well. Therefore, I was quite impressed with that book.

As a result, I decided to also use another Exam Cram book as my primary reference for exam 70-215, Windows 2000 Server. It was almost a mistake. I passed my 70-215 exam yesterday, but just barely.

Fortunately for me, in both cases, I supplemented the exam cram books with other materials. The 70-215 book is fairly well organized, has a reasonably good outline, and is easy to read. Maybe too easy. This book has some shortcomings. It is missing a lot of material that is actually on the exam. If I had used it as my only study guide, then I would have failed for certain!

The exam cram 70-210 book was pretty good. The 70-215 is a complete waste of money. It was not even good enough for review...let alone cramming for the test. Many required topics covered...but none deep enough to assist you in passing the test.

Although these books helped me through the WinNT 4.0 tests, they are a TOTAL waste of time and money for the Win 2000 books. The ONLY slight exception may be Win 2K Pro ExamCram.

1) They are all published in 2000. They didn't spend the time learning the O/S before pushing them out the door.
2) End of chapter questions are simplistic. Win2000 steps to the next level, and tests you across multiple subject areas. These questions are useless.
3) Errors. Misprints. The author obviously had only a superficial understanding of the material at the time she wrote this. I'm glad she loves her husband, but when I'm reading HER book, I would appreciate her spending more time getting the facts straight instead of rambing through pages of Acknowledgements.
4) Look, she's a NetAdmin at the University of Montana! I went there. There's not much involved.
5) I found myself correcting her on point after point, page after page. This was after I read the entire Syngress book cover to cover twice. It contained more detail for about the same price.
6) I'm studying for the test next week, and I'm so upset with this purchase that I'm wasting valuable study time to tell you DO NOT BUY THIS BOOK!

Use Syngress, and get your hands on Transcenders to save yourself time and money!

I took 70-215 yesterday and scored 880/1000. The ExamCram did a good job of summarizing the main objectives and was good as a concise review. However, it is not enough by itself to pass the test (nor is it positioned to be).

I felt that even thought the ExamCram isn't supposed to be as in depth as a 600+ page book, it still could have gone into more detail in a few areas, such as trouble shooting RRAS.

I'd recommend this book as a supplement to another method of study, but not as the sole method.

After only getting to page 46, I am completely disappointed in this waste of paper. I find myself constantly questioning the validity of the author's writings. After researching with the use of Help files and online resources, I find the author in error more often than not. Perfect example: what the heck are 'Frequently Qualified Domain Names?' Oh, did you mean 'Fully Qualified Domain Names?' Here's another, and I quote, "If you choose to format a new file system with a partition size larger than 2GB, Windows 2000 will automatically format it in FAT32." Huh? That's only if you choose to format a partition as FAT and size it over 2GB. At least every other page has errors, and the author has proven they have nothing but the slightest grasp of Windows 2000 Server. That's not what I need! I'm just worried about the errors that I *don't* catch. Too bad I've already purchased the Exam Cram book for 70-216.