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Amazon.com
At times much like an enjoyable lecture from
a professor who tends to ramble at times, Microsoft's A+
Certification Training is an excellent starting place for
beginners looking to fathom the mysteries of their PCs. But the
free-and-easy writing style of this book also makes it slightly more
difficult to study for the test; because the book touches on all
topics lightly, it might not prepare one for what lies ahead on the
final exam.
The good news is that the book is engagingly written, using a
conversational style that makes it an easy read. (As easy as
certification books get, anyway.) The reader is eased gently into
the PC with a historical introduction to the computer, including
discussions on the abacus, the Babbage engine, and eventually UNIVAC
I--then, the book moves up to showing pictures of common PC
accessories, like mice and scanners. As an A+ student's introductory
guidebook to the world of PCs, there isn't a better text available.
The book rapidly becomes more complex--as it must--diving into
the PC's inner components and showing them bit by bit. (Kindly
excuse the pun.) The basic concepts on the A+ exam are presented
clearly with somewhat chatty writing and lots of pictures, so it
should be a snap to get the A+ essentials down...but the
organization of the book is the stumbling block. As stated earlier,
it rambles.
For example, "Supplying Power to a Computer" is covered early on,
in Chapter 5, and the reader is advised to start opening up and
looking at computers, but "The Basics of Electrical Energy" isn't
covered until Chapter 13. It's likely that the novice electrician
would feel lost at times. Likewise, CPUs are covered in Chapter
4--but motherboards, where CPUs sit, aren't covered until Chapter 6,
and the expansion buses that peripherals use to talk to CPUs don't
get covered until four chapters after that. If one reads the book
all the way through, all will be made clear eventually, but there
will probably be times when the reader will want to flip ahead or
scan back.
The information, however, is solid, although not the most
up-to-date necessarily. (But then, with new CPUs coming out every
week nowadays, what hardware book is?) The essential PC operations
are covered nicely, and the explanations are sometimes dense, but
generally understandable.
The explanations, however, lead us to the final, and most
serious, problem with the A+ Training Guide: It's not a test
preparation book.
It's an introduction.
The A+ Training Guide covers pretty much everything one
would want to know about basic repairing and upgrading, but it
doesn't provide the critical focus necessary for the exam. Without
knowing which areas tend to be the "hot spots" on the A+ exam, the
reader could spend a lot of time studying, say, monitor repair, and
completely ignore the frequently tested CPU model comparisons
section. Furthermore, the test questions at the end of each chapter
are essay-style, not the multiple-choice questions that will appear
on the A+ exam. The questions are designed to test one's knowledge,
and they will--still, they probably won't help when it comes to
narrowing down one choice out of three reasonable-sounding answers.
In short, the guide goes over everything that's essential to know,
but it doesn't stress one part over another--which increases study
time and could make the reader fail the exam.
What this book is is an extremely good, well-written guide
for the student looking to get a comprehensive overview--and, to
that purpose, it does its job well. As a beginner's introduction to
the premises that are necessary to know for the A+ exam, this comes
highly recommended. But if the main goal is to get that
certification on a resume, the reader probably will want to start
out with this, and then move on to a book that tells
specifically what can be expected on the exam. --William
Steinmetz
Book Description
The A+ Certification program was
created by a consortium of companies, including Microsoft, to define
baseline knowledge and skill levels for IT professionals who support
hardware and software based on the Intel(r) platform. With the A+
CERTIFICATION TRAINING KIT, Second Edition, Microsoft applies its
popular, competency-based learning format to A+ Certification test
preparation. Entry-level IT professionals, computer service
technicians, and other computer science track students can use the
kit to build real-world expertise with systems hardware and
operating systems-as they prepare for the corresponding skill areas
of the A+ exam. The kit is modular and self-paced, with hands-on,
skill-building exercises. The entire course is featured on CD-ROM
for easy searches and
reference. |
