A little backgound about me, I graduated in Telecommunication field, i am a Cisco certified, and working in the networking field, and it is happened that my job now require me more Micosoft and Redhat Linux certified.

all i can say about this book is Useless and Disappointed. i can not express how disappointed i am with this microsoftpress book. it is such a wast of money and time.

the book is hard to read, each concept is not explained well at all, not deepth. especially the review questions in the book,each chapter has about 3-6 review questions, the question are decided just for kids, really... the questions in the book are very easy and not enuf they r no point and stupid.i am sure in the real exam, there will not b any questions simply ask "group policy is ______?" or "you can share _______ connection in home or small office by using ICS-Internet Connection Sharing" (asnwer=Internet). can u see how simple and stupid the questions are, and turely it just ask like this in the book.

I decided to stop and look for other resources, stop now, better than wasting my time (which i already wast my money for the book itself).

i strongly don't recommend this book to anyone, easpecialy who is preparing for exam, this book won't bring u to anywhere close.

if you want to donate your money, better make it somewhere else, not Bill's pocket, he is surely alot far richer than u, u should know that.

Disappointed --- Shall i buy MicrosoftPress' product again?

A little backgound about me, I graduated in Telecommunication field, i am a Cisco certified, and working in the networking field, and it is happened that my job now require me more Micosoft and Redhat Linux certified.

all i can say about this book is Useless and Disappointed. i can not express how disappointed i am with this microsoftpress book. it is such a wast of money and time.

the book is hard to read, each concept is not explained well at all, not deepth. especially the review questions in the book,each chapter has about 3-6 review questions, the question are decided just for kids, really... the questions in the book are very easy and not enuf they r no point and stupid.i am sure in the real exam, there will not b any questions simply ask "group policy is ______?" or "you can share _______ connection in home or small office by using ICS-Internet Connection Sharing" (asnwer=Internet). can u see how simple and stupid the questions are, and turely it just ask like this in the book.

I decided to stop and look for other resources, stop now, better than wasting my time (which i already wast my money for the book itself).

i strongly don't recommend this book to anyone, easpecialy who is preparing for exam, this book won't bring u to anywhere close.

if you want to donate your money, better make it somewhere else, not Bill's pocket, he is surely alot far richer than u, u should know that.

Disappointed --- Shall i buy MicrosoftPress' product again?

Per Microsoft Press, due to a recent update for a security fix.
KB840315
The exam that comes with this book on the CD does not work.

How did I find out? I bought the book. I tried the exam. I wrote to Microsoft Press and they told me this.

After reading only few chapters I am convinced that this is one of the best books about XP. (I have 4 of them including ExamCram2) I can definitely recommend this book to any one who is seriously preparing for the MCSA/MCSE 70-270 exam. I found answers to my questions easily and I suggest to people criticizing this book that they should read "About this Book" section, where you can find the chapter and lesson related to any exam objective. The writing style is excellent and easier to read. The book was written in 2001 so for added features and improvement in XP you have to consult "Windows XP Help"(highly recommended) and MSDN (this is expected when you study for an exam). I would keep this book as my primary source for MS 70-270.

This Book is the biggest POS I have ever had for a MCSE book. The cd is such a joke the testing software sucks so bad it does not even test you chapter by chapter. I went and took the 70-270 test and I was not ready for it at all. I went out and bought the sybex 70-270 book and its safe to say I will be so ready for the test now. The software on the sybex book lets you test yourself chapter by chapter and overall the book it set up much better.

This Book is the biggest POS I have ever had for a MCSE book. The cd is such a joke the testing software sucks so bad it does not even test you chapter by chapter. I went and took the 70-270 test and I was not ready for it at all. I went out and bought the sybex 70-270 book and its safe to say I will be so ready for the test now. The software on the sybex book lets you test yourself chapter by chapter and overall the book it set up much better.

This book is far away for being a complete study guide for 70-270 exam preparation. Many questions, that you'll see on the actual exam, do not covered in this book at all. If you are familiar with Win XP, you'll find this book totally useless. If you're newbie to WinXP, you'll see the lack of explanations in many important topics. I'm totally disappointed with Microsoft Press. If you want to pass the exam, choose Sybex.

The only reason I gave this book 3 stars is because, as nearly as I can tell, everything that I ran into on the test was mentioned in this book. I think IE configuration, troubleshooting portable computer configuration, and Windows XP Stop errors were extremely lacking. As is becoming more and more typical, this book had to many pages, and not enough of the right information.

As a side note, I did pass the exam on the first try, but I credit that more to real world experience than to this book.

This book is highly insufficient for passing MCSE.
There are no practice tests....book written just to give u a brief overview. Hardly deals with the scenario based questions that the original exam has....
Don't waste your bucks on this one...

It's a given that no one study guide will give you the understanding to pass the associated MCSE exam, but this barely qualifies as a study guide. For someone who has never worked with Windows before and has never seen XP before, this might be a good "Windows XP for Dummies"-like book. It does quickly gloss over most of the basics of the OS, how to network it and even how to deploy it, but falls short of even being a How-To for people looking to support and not wanting to study for the exam. A good example of just how much information this book lacks is to take the practice exam off the included CD-ROM. Less than five questions into the practice exam, the information needed to get the question right is not even covered in the book.

My suggestion would be to anyone who is looking to prep for the exam is to read the XP Resource Kit, the on-line help, and Microsoft's Readiness Review for XP - and leave this book on the shelf.

The book seems like it was rushed to the presses, as it is definitely lacking in necessary material for the exams. I'm very disappointed with this book.

The only reason I used to chose MS Press over Sybex in the past was the limited version of Win2k they included. Now that they don't include it, I won't be going with them, as I've never been thrilled about the actual books.

It is obvious that Microsoft rushed to get this book out. While is may be helpful in learning XP, it does no good when studying for the XP exam.

In the past, I have gone to Sybex for all my certification needs. I decided to try the Microsoft Press books this time for 2 reasons. First, it is the only certification guide for XP Pro (so far) and second, the CD had the E-Book version. I was excited for the E-Book. It was going to give me a reason to purchase that new Pocket PC that I wanted. When the book came I started looking on the CD for the lit file (for the Microsoft Reader), but found out the book is nothing more than a Help file. Come on Microsoft, support your own E-Book format! There are plenty of IT professionals out there with Pocket PC's who would love to be able to carry this book on their PDA.

As for the content of the book, so far it seems well written. I like how each chapter is broken into lessons. This give me a good stoping point in the middle of a chapter so I can get on my computer and pratice what I have just learned.

Without the trial software we are all inconvenienced by having to buy the product to test it, or to ask Microsoft for the product and wait close to eternity for it.

Why not include a trial version of the product in the kit, and leave out the digital version of the book? That would be truly helpful!

Microsoft's newest exam for the desktop is the Windows XP Professional and Microsoft is leading the way with the newest training kit. As with other training kits written my Microsoft Press this one has everything you'll need in order to have the best chance of passing on the first try.

Over 875 pages starts of the journey where you need to begin installing which includes topics like upgrading from previous version such as 98, NT or 2000. Setting up partitions, installing the system with defaults and changes you can make along the way.

From there user accounts is the next topics you'll encounter, looking at the built-in and domain accounts as well as management of these accounts. Moving along to network protocols you are given a great deal of information on TCP/IP, NWLink, DNS and lookup commands.

Some of the other topics covered are Troubleshooting networks and printers, NTFS, sharing resources like printers, drives and files. Also setting up multiple configurations, display settings, power requirements, user profiles and peripherals are included.

There is discussion on event logging, security and storage, tape backups, backup strategies and deployment of the newest operating system. With over 100 hands-on labs and exercises in over 80 lessons you have the perfect self paced training kit.

Finally there is a cd included with the complete e-book of the training kit and the Microsoft Encyclopedia of networking. Even though there are no practice test to take this is still an excellent tool for those you are striving to become and MCP for XP Professional.

MS Press seems to have a very hard time conceptualizing what they are selling - a packaged training experience. Their "MCSE 2000 Core Four" package has the trial version of the Windows 2000 Server CD, but no Professional CD for the Professional section. The XP Training Kit doesn't include a trial of the XP software - though these things can be obtained for free from Microsoft for the asking and waiting a few weeks. Get it together and put everything necessary in the box!

There is no software in this kit. Without installation software the kit is worthless.