Customer Reviews

Random House Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, Second Edition

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

 

 

I am utterly disgusted by Random House, a name I had before now considered to be one of the finest English language dictionary publishers in the business. While I still trust their scholarship, their avarice and duplicity has me so disturbed I am boycotting their dictionaries completely.

Unfortunately, my library just purchased this tome, which is billed as a "revised edition" . It is not revised in any manner which I could perceive -- as there aren't ANY NEW WORDS!!! Terms such as "blog", a word that has had a significant impact in interpersonal communication within the last two years or so, SHOULD have been included in a dictionary published in July of this year. But it is nowhere to be found!

Instead, Random House simply repackaged the 1999 edition, exchanging a red hardback cover/dust jacket for a new one in half green/half black. W-o-w. What a waste of money for consumers who are duped into thinking this is a N-E-W edition!

Random House publishers are so distracted by the dollar signs in their oculars they clearly haven't given a second thought as to how they are misleading, nay, ROBBING THEIR BUYERS!

I can confirm a previous reviewer's complaint - the print version of this Random House Webster's unabridged dictionary has a copyright of 2001. The dictionary is based on the larger and heavier 1987 Random House Unabridged Dictionary, Second Edition. This print version is listed with copyrights of 1987, 1993, 1996, 1997, 1998, and 2001. The CD ROM's WordGenius 4.3 that comes with it has a copyright of 2006.

Although I too was disappointed at not being able to purchase a newly edited dictionary, I must add that I liked the CD ROM a great deal even thought it contains no images. This software allows for all kinds of interesting searches based on approximate spellings, definitions, Boolean operations, wildcard designations, and searches that can even involve both a word specification and a definition specification. For example, by typing in "cat & rat" in the definition field, you can find all words with both "cat" and "rat" in their definitions: "cat and mouse," "farmer in the dell," "ratter," and "whisker." By typing "*book*" in the headword field and "v" (verb) in the definition field, you can find all verbs that contain "book" within them: "book," "double-book," "overbook," "prebook," and "rebook." The possibilities here are nearly endless.

To summarize: if you don't already own a good unabridged dictionary, this is a good one (as current dictionaries go). The software is well done, powerful, and fun. The publisher (and Amazon) get very bad marks for misleading the public regarding the copyright dates.

I bought this dictionary because of Random House's reputation AND because RH stated this 2005 edition is the most up-to-date reference work. This claim is one of several claims verified to be false. A RH staffer verified that this dictionary was published in 2002. The edition they sell now is the same exact book (republished/not re-edited in 2005). The next claim states that the front section of the book contains "NEW" words NOT listed in the main section nor introduced in previous edition. This claim is also false. "Agent", for example, is found in the "new words section" AND the main section. In addition, "agent" is not a new word at all. What's it doing in this new word section? A word such as "blog" (web log) should have been included in this new section. Since this dictionary is really from 2002, it is understandable - in hindsight - why it's not listed. This word was not used much, if at all, in 2002. It was easily recognized, however, in 2005. I would NOT have purchased this dictionary if I knew it was from 2002 NOT from 2005. I'm very disappointed at being defrauded.

I am trying to replace a previously "standard" edition of this dictionary - nice strong white paper and cloth bound - this edition is in a cheap paper cover and grayish newsprint-like paper. What used to be a $65 dollar execution is now apparently only available in a $ 130 de luxe version.

This dictionary is by far the most useful of the several dictionaries I have used (including Merriam-Webster and the Oxford English Dictionary). I would give it 5 stars. The CD is quite good, but a little disappointing in some ways: It contains none of the useful pictures and maps that are in the dictionary, and it is very unforgiving of spelling mistakes. Nonetheless, I have used it a lot; in a small PC it is much more wieldy than the dictionary.

The jacket, binding, and cover are of nice quality. The pages are grayish in color which makes the pages easy to look at while under bright lights, but they are thin and quite fragile with regard to tearing. This dictionary is quite large and heavy compared to "college" dictionaries. The content of the dictionary is superb. There are many pictures to go along with the definitions, there is a "new words" section, many of the definitions have examples of uses for the words. The definitions are impressive and clear. I am pleased with this dictionary.

Random House was not at all in my list in the past. I was a fan of Oxford for a long time. But when talking to a friend recently on different dictionaries, I came across this and he said I should take a look at it. I went to check the reviews in amazon and as the other reviews suggested it is way low in the rating. But I can not ignore my friend's request as he is very good in the art of this language with a great vocabulary. So I went to the store and checked, then I was amazed of the structure and sharp definitions. I checked it for few days then I replaced Oxford with this immediately and happily, does not mean RHUAD is on top of OED, but I am not up to the level of OED.

This unabridged dictionary nearing 315,000 entries for $60-$70 comes with slightly cheap paper & binding as other dictionaries, because of the quality of all products, materials including human life has gone down considerably nowadays. All of the dictionaries available in the market now have gone outside the boundary of education to pure business. So consumers are required to bring their expectations down dramatically.

Construction:

Most of the people are under the assumption of an unabridged dictionary should contain more words, at least 300,000 to 500,000 or ALL the words in the language. I believe it is not true. It is unabridged only in its content not the list of words. For example, a publication's storage has 500 words and each one has definitions either in one line or 10 lines, the dictionary with that full storage data can very well be called "UNABRIDGED". If someone takes 300 words out of it, edit the definitions to shorter form, say 10 lines to 3 lines and that dictionary is "ABRIDGED". It is difficult to count words from such big books. I took an average 'head word' count of at least 10 individual pages and multiply by the number of dictionary pages. It comes close to "170,000 - 172,000" head words. Many of them have more than one entry in definitions. So, I believe it has around "315,000" entries as the message printed on top of the book. There is another sentence in the amazon description says "Over 750,000 example phrases and sentences to show how words are used in context". It is hard to believe that or I don't know what parameters should be used to calculate that or I actually do not know what it means. So I assume that it is 75,000 which is an acceptable range.

Content:

It does not have so called "NEW" words, but no one is introducing 100 words per month on this language and expecting dictionaries having all words till yesterday. It surely has most of the words used till 1999 (as most of the people worrying that this is the same version as 1999 ) and that will be enough for 99% of the people in this world throughout their life to get proficiency in English. In my point of view, I loose nothing in this transaction, because all the new words found lately, one way or other I already knew it. So I don't need it in printing. I would want to check the words that I don't know, which I have plenty in this book.

In the usage notes and example sentences, it can not compete with other brands, like OALD and Longman. Because it is unabridged and not possible to put so many usage notes. But it has examples on important words.

It is not readily available for students, as it is so big and require very gentle handling if you want to have it for a long time without damage. You can not check your 20 SAT words in 2 mins. If you are student, the 'college' version of Random House is a very good choice, there is a portable 'mass market paberback' also availble.

In comparing contents, every dictionary is using almost same meaning. You can not find a entirely different meaning in two different brands of dictionaries. Same is here. It is common as the language standards. But there is a HUGE advantage in this dictionary, it lists out the most common definition used in United States first and the definitions are very SHARP and CLEAR. Most of the places it does not use the 'routing' method used by some of the populor brands in market by routing to another word to another word if they sound similar. For example a word 'dissonance' is listed in RH paperback as "1. inharmonious sound; discord. 2. lack of harmony or agreement." where as it is listed in MW paperback as just "DISCORD".

It also has another advantage, on pronunciation. The keys are SO simple that you can get the meaning in a few seconds by reading it. You don't need any special audio sound to do that. While it is difficult in Oxford brands for general users as it uses IPA system.

To improve your vocabulary with right definitions, clear pronunciation, this is the best available dictionary for a cheaper price.

The electronic version has identical content. It is simple, small. GUI looked to be built when windows 3.0 was released. But it WORKS. If you are happy to type or copy and paste words to get meaning, this can solve your problems. It additionally has a drag and drop option which I found very helpful.

There is no one best dictionary, even with Oxford, people have problems. Oxford Advanced Learners is way better than OED on usage notes, but OED is better than OALD in number of words. AHD is better than MW on etymology, but MW is better than all other dictionaries on being prescriptive rather than descriptive. RH is better than Oxford on definitions focused mainly United States region sharply and the story goes on and on for ever. We are not here to analyze and predict who is going to win the race as there is no such thing exists. Our mission is to just find the one that can help us when we need to find a meaning of a word. RHUAD can fulfil your needs.

This can also be a wonderful dictionary for you.

Lost my 2001 copy to fire. Replaced with RH-2nd ed., unabridge w/cd-rom. Good price. Worthless quality control. Improved binding, sleeves, cover, yes; distorted master-copy causes blotchy impressionistic print. Embedded format is caustically distorted; stronger, bolder some pages; flaky light, unreadable on others.

Several copies ordered/sent back (3 printings), all failed in the same locations and pages. Irritating to a fault. I like the Oxford(NOAD); every page elementally identical to the 1st page through 2076. Cost:$65.00. In fact, every dictionary I own (12) are perfect, beginning to end. Random House is facetting a flawed master copy. No quality control. Heaven help me....

I agree with "Katsnjabber" and "N. Thomas 'LibraryFiend'". I am so disappointed. I already had the 2nd edition, c2001. Then I saw notices of a 2nd "revised" edition dated 2005. I thought that if changes had been made, it should have been called the 3rd editon. But the 2005 date and the word "revised" confused me. So, I went ahead and ordered it and discovered to my disgust that it was the same as the one I already had! The copyright date on the verso of the title page was still 2001!

Another sucker

I got this dictionary a year ago for Christmas and always felt that it served me fairly well. Recently it fell off my bed and the front cover completely ripped off! It was then I discovered that my seventy dollar dictionary was bound with paper!! I am severely disappointed with Random House whom I thought was an honorable company. I looked at my Oxford thesaurus and sure enough, it was bound with cloth the proper way. I will be discarding this dictionary for one that is less expensive but no doubt of better quality.