Rating: 
Summary: You'll pass, but you won't be a master...
Review: This book will help you pass the exam if you are diligent and already fairly VB-savvy. On the bright side, it does cover all of the exam material. However, many topics are covered at a VERY shallow level or are discussed in confusing terms. Worse still, other areas seem to have been written by someone who had read Microsoft documentation but hadn't actually taken the time to understand what they had read or to test out the stated concepts thoroughly. Particularly obnoxious is Chapter 12. The author is clearly way out of his/her depth when it comes to designing and implementing COM components. The lab exercise to implement a callback procedure for asynchronous processing is laughable, as the steps it leads you through never kick off an asynchronous process (clearly showing that the author doesn't really understand what asynchronous processing is). The author thinks that because the windows message queue remains responsive, it proves that asynchronous processing is being used. Oops, sorry, wrong answer.If it's important to you to really explore these concepts and learn something useful, supplement your use of this book. If there is anything that you read here that seems contradictory, or unclear, or is just plain new to you -- pull up keywords in the MSDN library and go to town. Get hands on to try things out in VB if something in the Hawhee sounds fishy or if you've never had real-world experience with a particular concept. Get the Appleman book for a reference on the Win32 API(you should have it anyway). Take a look at the Pattison book (Programming Distributed Applications with COM and VB6) for information on COM and how VB fits in. These two books will serve you well as references for a long time. If you just want to pass the exam, and don't care about actually understanding and being able to apply the information that you're being tested on, just buy this book. You'll probably slide by, even if you have to give it a couple of tries. Just please don't ever come work for my company -- I'm positive I wouldn't enjoy working with you.
Rating: 
Summary: The sample test is representative
Review: I agree with everybody else. This is a really good book to use for studying and passing the test. One thing I like is that the study questions are about the same level of difficulty as the real test. On the sample test I scored 869, and on the real test I scored 842. If you can pass the sample test, you can pass the real thing.
Rating: 
Summary: You can rely on this book
Review: This was the only book I read seriously. I suppliemented it with Exam Cram and Transcender. Exam cram was useless. I can say for sure that this is the only book you require to pass the exam. And yes, do test yourself with Transcender and other beta tests. I passed the exam in first attempt (scored 942) and there was not a single question which I had to guess. Well, this book covers everything. The book not only makes you confident in exam but also makes you understand the concepts with lots of lab exercises.
Rating:
Summary: Extraordinary Book !
Review: Its a great book. Things are well explained, almost no errors, and good examples. Study it thoroughly, and 175/176 is a breeze.
Rating:
Summary: All exam's subjects covered, too little on them
Review: It's not a bad book but it's surely not the greatest either. I guess that it is an "okay" book for an exam but for real life, it's something else. Then again, it depends on the quality of developers we want out there. I'm a 4 years experience business application developer where my only working interface is the web through ASP or DHTML application (but also for Netscape so...) and i'm lacking some experience for UI interfaces like VB Applications, ActiveX Documents and others. From comments for that book, it was meant as a general book and it is; the only problem is that it goes quite fast on every subjects. I would say that it is a beginner's book but then, some of the language is quite technical so the book is more than focused on the exam's objectives. Also, even though you have 1200 pages, most of them are half blank so don't count on the number of pages to make your idea. Then again, for the exam's, it's not bad and probably one of the best. For extensive developer references, go look at Wrox books like VB6 Business Objects and ADO/RDS with ASP.
Rating:
Summary: Good Technical Resource
Review: Has errors when you can spot them you know your ready - passed 70-176 first try - no problems - best technical resource I have found compared to the others -if anyone else has better please let me know - i'm getting ready for 70-175
Rating:
Summary: Very good book
Review: This was the only book that I used for the exam and I did very well. It is very thorough and covers everything that you need to know for the exams. It does have quite a bit of information if you are experienced in VB, but you can skim over what you already know. I think this would be a good book for someone new to VB because of the detail and sample labs at the end of each chapter.
Rating:
Summary: Beginners Beware
Review: Although very comprehensive and contextual structured, MCSD training guide is not tailored for beginners. The writers of this book assume that the student is quite familiar with Visual Basic. However, the language is very technical, inundating the reader with technical jargon without introducing basic concepts. Its exercises, although excellent for your more advanced learners, assume that the reader can already code in Visual Basic. Bottom line: The book makes too many assumptions, even for those familiar with Visual Basic.
Rating:
Summary: Good but way too big for this exam
Review: This is a great book. Its one of the easiest to follow and understand. Very well written (except for some typos, but that's OK). If you are looking to understand stuff quick, this book is it. The only downside is that it is way too big! You get bored soon and stop paying attention. Plus it covers maybe 60% more than the exam needs. For example, the questions on MTS in the exam can be covered in about 2 pages or three worth of text in a book. But this book has two chapers on it! Too much detail! So halfway through I realised that I should use an exam cram and then use this book as support where necessary. The best is the MCSD VB6 Distributed Exam Cram which can be used even for the desktop exam since most of the material is the same anyway. That cram book is excellent! Just covers what is needed and no more! So use that and when you don't understand something go back to the big book. All in all, these two books would be your best bet. I passed the exam with 871 and I am new to VB!
Rating:
Summary: Very Good Book
Review: Best bang for the buck. I used this book to study for both tests and passed them with a 94% and 84%. The book hits every topic you need to learn.
| 
