Rating: 
Summary: Not so good ....
Review: At the moment, I'm using this text in one my graduate classes. It's a very general text that does not go into much detail and uses far too many acronyms to follow what is being said. At times the text contradicts itself making the whole reading experience confusing! Trying to answer the questions at the end of the text pushes you to search other resources.
Rating: 
Summary: This can be better book. Author is very good.
Review: Book does not go in the detail and there are some errors. This book is very superficial. I have used this book in my graduate school and also I have taught this book in my graduate class as Teaching Assistant. Book talks about basics but does not explain the real world example or real world co-relations. Also this book is not well organized.
If one wants to read good networking book read the book Computer Networks by Tanenbaum. Also the problems at the end of the chapters are totally irrelevant of the topics covered in the book.
Rating:
Summary: The concepts are *NOT* explained thoroughly!
Review: I am currently using this book for a graduate course in broadband networks. Like many books and software these days, this book was thrown together in fire-drill fashion. It has surprisingly few typographical errors and the chapter introductions are good overviews in terms of what services various nets are well-suited for, and how things evolved. However, this book's pseudo-explanations are consistently *incomplete* and confusing. I have read Chapters 1 through 6 so far. (Chapters 1-4 are primarily undergrad level "network-ology.")Here are just two examples from the myriad: The Chap. 5 "explanation" of a SONET frame is woefully incomplete and confusing, and left me and my study partner with more questions than answers. One class meeting *after* this was introduced (when we had a chance to refer to this book for understanding), there was a *mob* around the prof. after lecture asking for clarification on the STS frame. Chap. 6/ pp. 219-220 attempt to explain how SONET LOH byte H3 is used for frequency justification. Neither I nor the TA were able to glean any meaning from these paragraphs after several re-readings (which seem to suggest that the H1 byte itself is for overflow data, which of course would make no sense --H3 is a pointer like H1 and H2), and in the accompanying figures H3 points to nothing! Here is a point that might not be the authors' fault, but: the AAL (ATM adaptation layer) header/trailer formats in the book are obsolete according to my professor, who supplied us with handouts of the current formats. The chapter-end problems (which we are doing for homework) are *WAY* beyond the ken of the text, and all of us are desperately referring to other texts by Stallings and others, and wearing out the poor prof. and TA with questions. It is *not possible* to do the problems with this book as a sole reference. If you need more than an overview, forget this book. A cursory flip-through of this book would have fooled me (from the diagrams) that it contains the detail I need, but the text leaves me crying for the clarity more typical of William Stallings' books! I only came to Amazon this morning to buy *MORE* books (this time one on real analysis since I already have a John Freund book on statistics) to help me get the next homework done! I don't like posting a harsh criticism like this, but I was appalled to see a review praising this book's explanations.
Rating: 
Summary: Bambos bamboozles.
Review: I hate this book. It covers a lot of interesting information, but when you want to learn about the specifics, you're better off going online. The problems in the book cannot be found in the text, good online sources is the only answer. Besides not having the information to do the problems, it also have bad wording and many different interpretations of the question is possible. My only positive perspective of this book is that it forces you to go do research, be it online or in the library. But in terms of learning the material, this book is a no-no. This book is not worth the 80-100 dollars that it cost...you can use it to know that there are certain topics in the field, but if you want to learn about the topic, you'll have to look elsewhere. Thus this can only be useful as a doorstop, or a blunt weapon to hit yourself due to the high level of stress you will receive from it.
Rating:
Summary: Blunt Review
Review: I hate this book. It covers a lot of interesting information, but when you want to learn about the specifics, you're better off going online. The problems in the book cannot be found in the text, good online sources is the only answer. Besides not having the information to do the problems, it also have bad wording and many different interpretations of the question is possible. My only positive perspective of this book is that it forces you to go do research, be it online or in the library. But in terms of learning the material, this book is a no-no. This book is not worth the 80-100 dollars that it cost...you can use it to know that there are certain topics in the field, but if you want to learn about the topic, you'll have to look elsewhere. Thus this can only be useful as a doorstop, or a blunt weapon to hit yourself due to the high level of stress you will receive from it.
Rating:
Summary: Forget about this one!!
Review: I started to read this book as a text book for a graduate class in networking. I wanted to share my experience so that others can avoid the pain that I felt. If your goal is to actually learn something useful about networks this book is not for you. Reasons to not like this book.... 1) The author does not explain in detail the important concepts. Lots of holes in the presentation of the material. 2) Almost every diagram in this book is confusing. The descriptions are not clear and the text does not help to explain them. 3) Homework problems have little to do with the text. You almost need to have another text to find the answers. Also, the problems were of little educational value. Plus, there are many ambigious questions that can have any number of meanings. There are many good book on networking and this one is not one of them. After being discoraged by the content of this book I started to read "Internetworking with TCP/IP" By Dr. Comer, for a clear understanding of the same concepts. This book is fantastic and I would recommend it to anyone for a professional reference or graduate networking text book.
Rating:
Summary: Forget about this one!!
Review: The book exceeded all my expectations as a comprehensive discourse on networking. It is extremely difficult to write a book that caters equally well to students and professionals alike - but the authors seem to have succeeded in the task. For professionals in the field of networking, the book is an invaluable and comprehensive resource whether to refer a quick topic, or to study a concept in detail. It is also very up-to-date, complete with current internet numbers. For students, the fluid style makes good reading and the important concepts are explained thoroughly. The authors also make a fine balance between qualitative ideas and mathematical basis behind key results. Finally, the exercises are very useful, and sometimes even lead to contemorary research issues. As someone who was a graduate student until recently, and currently working in the industry - I can say that the book works great for both. All in all, an excellent and timely book for networking people (see my star rating ;-)
Rating:
Summary: Excellent book both for students and networking professional
Review: The book exceeded all my expectations as a comprehensive discourse on networking. It is extremely difficult to write a book that caters equally well to students and professionals alike - but the authors seem to have succeeded in the task. For professionals in the field of networking, the book is an invaluable and comprehensive resource whether to refer a quick topic, or to study a concept in detail. It is also very up-to-date, complete with current internet numbers. For students, the fluid style makes good reading and the important concepts are explained thoroughly. The authors also make a fine balance between qualitative ideas and mathematical basis behind key results. Finally, the exercises are very useful, and sometimes even lead to contemorary research issues. As someone who was a graduate student until recently, and currently working in the industry - I can say that the book works great for both. All in all, an excellent and timely book for networking people (see my star rating ;-)
Rating:
Summary: Pretty bad
Review: The book is pretty bad ... high level junk. Also, Rajarshi Gupta, the only one with the 5 star rating, I belive, has some connections to Berkeley and perhaps the authors even ... hence the review must be taken in that context.
Rating:
Summary: A book covers everything but nothing at all
Review: This book was used as the text of our graduate level course "telecommunication networks", but our instructor rarely used it in lectures, although he mentioned that most of the content would be covered in the exams. And we finally found that he cheated us, because this text was useless to prepare for the exams. :) I find that this book almost covers everything, such as ISO/OSI, TCP/IP, telephone networks, xDSL, ATM, SONET, wireless, etc. When you want to know something, you can always find the terms in the index, but when you access the content and you will find it is so hard to read. You spend a lot of time on it, but at last you still do not understand more. I recommend Tanenbaum's Computer Networks is a good book to understand many terms in communication networks, although there is some mistakes, such as CRC was interpreted as Cyclic Redundancy Code. If you want to know queuing theory, you can refer to Saadawi, et al.'s Fundamentals of Telecommunication Networks. If you want to know routing and switching, you can have a look at Perlman's Interconnections, Second Edition. These books are good to understand the basic theory of networking. When you buy a book, your book should explain the relative terms thoroughly but maybe not cover everything, and with least errors and typos. Otherwise, you will feel annoyed to have it on your bookshelf.
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