MCSE Self-Paced Training Kit (Exam 70-298): Designing Security for a Microsoft Windows Server 2003 Network,   ISBN:9780735619692

Customer Rating: 

To all, this is my last exam for MCSE status. I purchased all the Microsoft Press books as preparation and coupled with my experience, it has sufficed.

I did complete reading this book, however this book is poorly written. The author spends a entire chapters speaking in generalities and leaves how to design security and remediate security risks to your own judgment.

Wait, I take some of that back. The author does use some specification in the book and refers to all administrators, users and clients as female. Not that it matters, but I prefer the past books where they were androgynous.

Since this is my last exam I purchased other materials. I highly recommend purchasing CBT Nugget videos as it thoroughly explains security design and it's implementation.

Customer Rating: 

This book was essential for me as a reference for an MCSE boot camp. It is now part of my reference library. Will answer many questions that pop up during the study process.

Customer Rating: 

No offense to Roberta but this book was absolute torture to read. I guess some people who really love abstract security concepts would eat this up but as an IT generalist it was not my cup of tea. The author spends more time trying to come off as a walking thesaurus than providing parallels in the technology this book is supposed to cover. For the most part, the concepts here are very general and you may wonder if you're even reading about Windows Server 2003. Despite that, once you cut through the vocabulary-touting fluff, the strategies are of course helpful for the security focus of this exam.

Customer Rating: 

Although I feel a one-ness with a Network Engineer that wears orange toe socks (I have ones with squirrels on the end which I have also worn at the airport much to security's chagrin), I can't help but feel that the twenty-something self-taught demographic (the bulk of our upcoming network engineers) will desire something more from this book.

The technical aspects are less than easy to follow, whereas the theory is sound but somewhat disorganized. Overall, the book is a review of what I know from the core MCSE tests and a double-check on my security common sense.

On the other hand - I can't say how it could be written better, Security is a learned skill, and taught best in the wild. Therefore I recommend this book - at a minimum you will get an impressive asterisk next to your MCSE on your resume and at best you'll get an insight into security on a Windows network.

Customer Rating: 

MCSE Self-Paced Training Kit (Exam 70-298): Designing Security for a Microsoft® Windows Server(TM) 2003 Network (Training Kit)

This is the ultimate resource for training for your certification and for reference after you are certified. I recommend this to all those who want to understand the complex process of designing network security.