Microsoft Windows Networking Essentials

I read this book as an introduction to networking in an attempt to prepare myself for some of the more in-depth books on the subject. I used this along with the Mike Myer's Network+ All-in-One and the CompTIA Network+ Exam Cram to pass my Network+ exam after a month and a half of studying.To start, the quality of this book is something to behold. It really feels like when Sybex made the "Essentials" series they really took an attentive effort to create something that you'd be proud to have on your bookshelf. The book comes with full-color pictures, glossy white pages, and feels like it could stand up to quite a bit of handling.Content-wise this book is truly a godsend for someone who really needs things laid out step by step or may not have a lot of experience in the field. He takes his time and defines a lot of jargon before using it in his explanations which I found to be very beneficial. Also, he doesn't go too deep into a subject as to overwhelm you.This was actually the first book I read by Darril and his ability to effectively model complex subjects is what lead to my decision to buy two of his other books on computer security. Despite all this, there were a few times throughout the book that I felt as if prior information, introduced earlier in the book, was conflicting with what I was currently reading. This was especially the case when it came to the section on subnetting. A few of the models there either felt like they had typos or I wasn't understanding them correctly. I'm sure the book has been thoroughly checked for content errors, so I attribute this more to presentation than anything. All other models in the book I found to be very succinct and exactly what I needed to grasp each concept.I'd recommend this book to the person that has grown up with IT their whole life, but has never actually learned what is going on behind the scenes. Also, this serves a good primer for more in-depth material on the subject.

I used this book for my MTA 98-366 exam and just passed the other day with a 90. It only took about 15 minutes to take the test. Overall I felt like it did a great job preparing me for the test but I would supplement it with something to go slightly deeper. I typically prepare for these types of exams with a couple of sources. Anything that was not clear I just used Mike Myers CompTIA Network+ book to fill in the gaps. I will be doing that test also so I bought that as a supplement.I gave it a four because the chapter on IPv4 was quite messed up. There were a lot of mistakes that really need to be cleaned up pronto in this section and it was a bit lacking in explanation. Maybe it is just because I am not the sharpest ax in the woodshed but he could do a better job explaining dividing into subnets. I looked at some of the free Professor Messer videos on Network+ and his video explaining the dividing into subnets was excellent. It was just what I needed as a visual learner to catch what was happening in the binary. Subnetting is not a particularly hard concept, it just has to be explained in the right way and most people will get it.In his next revision of this book I would make the questions a bit more difficult. Microsoft tends to be less straight forward with the questions than this book. Might help to make us dig a bit deeper.

I took and passed the MTA 98-366 Exam, but it was not by this book alone. (Exam date 3/20/15)While it is a good book and has good information, my problem with it is that it is being sold as a book for the exam listed on the front cover. The reasons I marked it only a 3 star are listed below.This book does not have all the material alone that you will need to pass the exam (maybe 80% of exam objectives). You will want to find some additional exam questions as well. I also used the Microsoft Virtual Academy for free videos on this topic. That also is not enough alone to pass the exam. but together worked well. This book is written in a very reader friendly fashion and explains info well. However there is some critical information missing on WAN technologies and different Network Topologies. ETC.As noted in some other comments, This book has quite a few errors. specifically in the Sub-netting section. and even the corrected answers on the sybex website are wrong. However, if you get the concept of what they are saying in that section then you can Identify the errors. If you don't, then you will be confused and still not understand it.Overall it was a decent book and gave a good amount of information, even if it lacked many key details. It would be a great book if you do not intend to take the exam and just want some basic knowledge of networking. For those taking the exam, the questions in this book are way too easy, you have to understand more practical networking use and troubleshooting.

The book has been good for the most part up until chapter 5, which is on IPv4. There are so many errors in the subnetting section of this chapter, even the correction (from book website) for the error for the End of Chapter Solution is incorrect. It asked to divide a network into 2, but the corrected solution shows two subnets from a network that was divided by 4.Also an end of chapter question solution explanation is totally off the wall. And another question has two answers, but it only shows one solution. I hope the rest of the book isn't like this.Also in this chapter, the method for subnetting isn't really spelled out, you kind of have to put pieces together and figure it out.Poorly written chapter.I guess the positive of these errors was that I learned more and understand more by finding and correcting these errors.Other than this chapter, the book has been good.Now onto the chapter on IPv6........I took the exam, and it was easy. This book covers more than enough for passing the exam.

I used the Microsoft Networking Essentials book way back in about 1996 to learn about networking and study for my first MCSE back in the NT 3.51 days. I was after a book to refresh my memory on alot of the concepts and get up to date with all the technology advances and updates that have occurred since then. And lo and behold an updated version of the trusty old Networking Essentials book appears! I found the book really useful to remind myself of forgotten concepts and standards but there are pro's and cons to it...Pros: Easy to read and understand, it covers a wide range of topics pretty well and I found it waslayed out in a visually attractive manner. It explains lots of stuff that I kind've understood but had never had fully spelt out to me before.Con's: At 300 pages and covering as much ground as it does its not the most in-depth book you'll find on any of the topics it covers. Then again it's called "Networking Essentials" for a reason.In summary if you are new to networking or like me are a bit rusty and want to remind yourself of some long forgotten concepts and update you're knowledge this book is well worth a look. If you already know networking quite well and are after an in-depth networking bible this is not the book for you.

As with all the books in the Microsoft certification series, this is very clearly written in an easy to follow language. The illustrations help a great deal and important concepts are annotated on the sleeves.

Most people wanting to buy this book, will want to know one thing. "Will it help me pass the 98-366 exam?" Well, I sat the exam about 10 days after buying this book and passed it easily.TBH the test is FAR,FAR,FAR easier than the questions and content in the book, which I guess is a good thing.ONE REALLY BAD POINT though, the chapter on ipv4 addresses has literally DOZENS of fundamental mistakes... in both the exercises and in the explanations. I was pretty confused until I realised that it was the book, not me that wasn't understanding the concepts...Thats a huge negative for the book, but if you want a book to study up for the 98-366 then it'll do the job.

Very good book, however my copy is missing about 30 pages. It goes from page 170 to 203 despite having these missing pages listed in the contents section.Very disappointing as I have missed the returns window and genuinly had no way of knowing this until I got to page 170. Does anyone know if a return/swap could still be arranged? If not through amazon then maybe through the publisher?

Good book for beginners. This book helped me to pass MTA network foundation. Some information are out of date but still worth to read it.