Title i-Net+ Certification Study System Authors Joseph J. Byrne Publisher Hungry Minds Publication Date April 2000 ISBN 0764546554 Price $39.99 (U.S.) Pros User-friendly, well structured. Cons Material is simplified a bit too much. Verdict A reasonable secondary resource, but don't count on it as your sole prep tool.

CompTIA's i-Net+ certification is a relatively new credential, but its popularity is growing. Designed to assess your baseline Internet skills, i-Net+ is a launching point for further Internet study. Although the amount and type of information necessary to maintain an appreciable level of expertise is changing, foundational knowledge is the key to continued success. Hungry Mind's "i-Net+ Certification Study System" and Sybex's "i-Net+ Exam Notes" are geared towards helping you understand the foundational Internet knowledge on the i-Net+ certification exam and, together, they get the job done.

The Hungry Minds text is the more complete of the two books, as it is designed to be a complete study system. "i-Net+ Exam Notes," in contrast, is meant to be used primarily as a review tool for you to "brush up" prior to the exam. Each has benefits, but based on my testing experience, I don't think using either one by itself will provide sufficient preparation for the certification exam; using them to augment one another is a more sound test preparation strategy.

"i-Net+ Certification Study System" covers all major test areas — there is no topic that isn't mentioned. The text is divided into five sections, with the section breaks matching the test subtopics listed by CompTIA in Appendix 1 and on CompTIA's Web site (www.comptia.org/certification/inetplus/blueprint.pdf). There is one minor difference — the Networking and Security sections that are listed separately on the exam blueprint are combined into a single three-chapter section in the study guide. Chapters are broken up by subheads, and include an icon system (similar to that found in other Hungry Minds books) alerting you to concept links, cautions, exam prep pointers, notes and tips. There are plenty of charts, tables, code examples and other devices designed to highlight important material. Both a summary and an "Instant Assessment" quiz follow each chapter.

Much of the guide's text is written in the first person, and the tone is conversational, both of which add to the guide's readability. The author frequently drops in suggestions, personal recommendations and references, which makes it seem as if he really wants you to learn the material.

This volume comes with a CD-ROM that contains seven Internet utilities, along with the ubiquitous Acrobat Reader/PDF version of the book combination. Rather than leave the installation and use of the utilities to the reader's own initiative, the author has written hands-on exercises that use them. The procedures are clear, and I had no difficulty completing any of the labs. I found this to be both welcome and beneficial. I was happy with the collateral depth that the selection of utilities provided, and feel that they added value to the study guide overall. The primary tool on the CD-ROM is the Beachfront Quizzed sample test generator. This test prep tool allows the user to simulate exams over and over, or to instead select one of the five sections of the book for concentrated study. The simulator interface is easy to use and navigate, and is configurable to allow you to format the simulation to best fit your learning style. It also references the study guide itself for additional clarification.

There were two problems that I found with this study guide that preclude my giving it a whole-hearted recommendation. The first problem is the depth to which the material is covered. The level recommendation on the back of the book reads "Beginner to Advanced." That statement tells you that the guide is trying to be all things to all readers. This lack of focus skewed the content toward the easy side, not by omitting the harder topics, but by relegating coverage of the more difficult topics at the level of term recognition. While this may help less advanced readers get by on the test, it's an insufficient degree of difficulty if your goal is really to understand what you're doing. This shortcoming is magnified by the questions on the Instant Assessments — they're just too easy to serve as the sole preparation for the actual exam. This is true also of the questions on the simulator. The Beachfront Quizzer questions are a whole lot easier than the ones you'll find on the test. An inexperienced user could conceivably pass multiple simulations with good scores and find the exam difficult (or impossible) to pass. Consequently, I was lulled into a heightened (though not false) sense of security.

The second shortcoming is that "i-Net+ Certification Study System" is poorly edited, which diminishes the impact and value of some portions of the material, and flat-out confuses others. For example, page 37 says:

"For now, it's only important to know that an IP address comprises four sets of three digits each, such as 192.168.100.105."

What's missing is the word maximum, as in "four sets of a maximum of three digits each" As written, the sentence says that each octet must have three digits, which is not true. 192.168.20.5 is a valid IP address as well. There are other examples. Material about Internet standards and RFCs introduced on page 15 is in part repeated on page 43, and is not structured as a review. On page 44 we are told twice (in consecutive paragraphs) that the Internet Engineering Task Force meets three times per year. Neither these editing errors nor any of the others I found are earth-shaking mistakes, but they reduce both the overall professionalism of the guide and my opinion of it.

	Title i-Net+ Exam Notes Authors David Groth and Dorothy L. McGee Publisher Sybex Publication Date March 2000 ISBN 0782126383 Price $24.99 (U.S.) Pros Depth of coverage. Cons Not enough sample questions. Verdict Use this to supplement another resource, unless you're already an Internet whiz.

Sybex's "i-Net+ Exam Notes" suffers from fewer problems, in large part because it doesn't try to do as much. It's a distillation of the core concepts, important points, definitions and essentials necessary to know in order to pass the test. "i-Net+ Exam Notes" can also serve as a stand-alone reference/preparation tool for established Internet/Networking professionals who want to do a pre-test tune-up to make sure they find no surprises come exam time.

The layout is almost that of an outline, with little narrative text connecting each section. Horizontal rules abound, segmenting the content into bite-size pieces for easy review. Sample questions appear at irregular intervals throughout the text.

I found the material in "i-Net+ Exam Notes" to be more compact, but also a bit more complete and rigorous than the material in "i-Net+ Certification Study System." The questions are a bit harder than those in the first book. The material in this text follows a logical flow, and is well-indexed. For example, the index contains an entry for canonical name (CNAME) records, an entry you won't find in "i-Net+ Certification Study System" index. This main shortcoming of the Sybex text is that it doesn't contain all that many sample questions. Doubling the amount of questions available would increase its value tremendously.

I wouldn't recommend either of these study guides by themselves as sufficient preparation for the i-Net+ exam, except for experienced Internetworking professionals who want to make sure that they're on the right track. But by using them together, you can take the best from each and put together an effective study and preparation program that will help you achieve your i-Net+ certification.

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More articles by Bob Potemski:

• Get Smart!
  
• A Complete i-Net Education
  
• Certification Success Stories
  
• An Inside Look at i-Net+