Arthur Pfund | Todd Lammle | Sybex
1 Unacceptable absence of detail!
This book just pastes in the output of Cisco commands without any adequate explainations. Obviously the authors know less about the material than many of the readers...
Notice that all the "positive" reviews give no details as to what's good about this book. I guess Lammle and Co. are going to have to submit more "reviews" to compensate for this bit of realism...
2 Not Sybex's best bot a good study guid
This is not the usual Sybex study guide quality but it's still a good book. I purchased it with the expetation of being a great book and it fell short. To me there was a lot of filler that didn't need to be there. I would have liked to have seen more meat and less potato's...I know potato's fill pages but the meat is what you need to pass the test.
This book will help you prepare for the CIT exam but will not get you there.
3 This book has everything you need to pass the CIT
Hear me know, believe me later: There was not one subject on the CIT exam that was not covered in this book! Be forewarned, it doesn't prepare you for the ridiculous phrasing and grammer used in the test to throw you off. I don't think any book can do that. Only real world experience can help you though those. If you used this book as your main study guide and failed the test, it is because you didn't study enough.
4 There is no 'real-world' experience in this book...none!
This somes up every chapter in this book: Pages and pages full of unexplained cut and paste show commands. Tuns and tuns of show commands listed in line, no real-world troubleshooting experience given to add some meaning to the commands.
The book reminds me of my college essays I used to do: Filled with padding to get to that mimumim required number of pages, and done at the last minute, without having done any 'real' research.
5 Too Much Filler; "Troubleshooting Lite"
I bought this book as a companion to my Cisco Press troubleshooting book, but in the last few weeks, I found myself referring to this book less and less.
There is some good information, but if you are taking CIT as your last or next-to-last exam, a good deal of material is copied directly from the earlier Sybex books in the series. Nothing wrong with going over the material -- after all, you're learning to troubleshoot the material you've learned previously -- but I felt like a lot of this book was simply regurgitating earlier books instead of giving me fresh insight.
As I said, there were some good points. The chapter on troubleshooting methodology had some good examples, and having screen output for the commands helps those who don't have routers of their own to experiement with. Even that goes to extremes, though. At times there are pages and pages of redundant screen output when they need to be putting more solid information in.
Also, there's not much information on the actual contents of frames in different protocols. For those of us working with CCIE in mind while working on our CCNP, that's detail that shouldn't be left out. Overall, the lack of detail in this book really surprised and disappointed me.
You might very well be able to pass the exam with just this book if passing the exam is your sole goal. For those of us looking for more detail (and the exam has plenty of that!), I would recommend the Cisco Press book over this one.
6 Can't understand the good reviews.
This is the most 'padded out' technical book I have ever seen. I can't see why anyone would be impressed by this. I notice that most of the positive reviews for this book are pretty brief and don't give any particular reason for buying the book only that they "passed the exam". Perhaps I am just a cynic... There are surely better ways of setting about passing this exam. The fact that the only good material in the book is pretty basic LAN stuff suggests that the authors are not of a sufficient level. I thought Sybex were good for the CCNA, but now they seem to be getting out of their depth. Let's hope they don't start writing CCIE study guides next. Or if they do, that people are not naive enough to buy them.
7 Nice book, lots of information, passed the exam.
Thanks to this book, I am now a CCNP! This was my last exam in the series. This book had all the information needed to pass the CIT exam.
8 Passed the exam with ease. Has al the info for the CIT exam.
I passed the CIT using only the Sybex CIT Study Guide and Sybex CIT Notes book. I recieved a high passing score the first time I sat the exam. I recommend it highly.
9 Needs less quantity and more quality
Make sure you take a good look at this book before you purchase!At first sight it appears useful since it touches on most of the important topics. Unfortunately, "touch" is the operative word. Much of the book is filled with Router outputs that have little and in many case NO accompanying explanations. I consider this to be unacceptable. The treatment of the more complex topics, such as OSPF and EIGRP to name just two, is so scant as to be insulting to the reader. It appears as if the book was either thrown together very quickly or that the authors lack the necessary quality. In either case, it is just not good enough.
10 Thick in volume, thin on content.
This book appears very thick, but after a quick skim it becomes very apparent that the book is has been "padded out".
Alot of the IOS outputs that fill the center pages are needless and unexplained. The questions are not well thought out and consume about 1/3 of the book
Laura Chappel's book from Cisco is thinner, has about twice as much information and is well structured in comparison.
11 Easy to read, but not good enough
I bought this book 5 days before I took the exam. I thought it was a good one as many readers rated it 5 stars. I passed the exam but I found it did not help me any. I passed the test because of my experience as well as using other books. I totally agreed to one of some other comments, this book lacked of explanations of many debug and show commands. After all, it is easy to read but not good enough to help you prepare the exam.
12 Good book, but lacks explanations on show, debug commands
I passed the exam with a 907, but I feel the actual course material gave a much better explanation of show and debug outputs. About one third of my test was ISDN related and I don't feel he covered this subject adequately. Other than that it was an easy book to read.
13 A good book, but you need the course material to score high
A good resource book, I used this book with the course book to study and pass the CIT exam. You need the course material and experience to pass this exam.
14 Good Preparation for the 640-406 Examination
This book is good preparation for the exam. But you will need to suppliment it with the Cisco Internetwork Troubleshooting book author: Laura Chappel, ISBN: 1-57870-092-2. Since the test is based on troubleshooting from Cisco's perspective. That means the methods used should conform to there standards, not Bay and/or Lucent's. Master the techniques for problem solving various types of networks, TCP/IP, Netware IPX/SPX, Appletalk, NT etc. The skills obtained in this course will assist you with the CCIE Lab. This is the foundation of your skill set for years to come.
15 Good troublshooting info, passed the exam.
The text is a little dryer then the CCNA study guide, but I don't think Todd wrote this book, only edited it. His name is listed last on the cover. However, I passed the exam. Seems like the book did what it was suppose to do.
16 This book has great information, and I passed the CIT exam!
If you want to know what is on the CIT exam, buy this book. Plus it has great Cisco troubleshooting information.
17 Received my book on Friday, so far, it is great.
This is a great book. I have read the first five chapters, and it is formatted real nice. I bought Lammle's CCNA book, and I really liked that book. This is a book of information. It has a lot of stuff that I can use at my work right away. I haven't taken the exam, but I should take it in about two weeks. I'll let you know how it goes. The review questions at the end of each chapter are pretty hard, and they cover the harder concepts found in each of the five chapters I have been through.
