Book Reviews
Getting Certified on Exchange 2000
The book, despite some drawbacks, is still a useful exam-prep tool for experienced Exchange 5.5 administrators.
Looking to pass Microsoft exam 70-224, Installing, Configuring, and Administering
Microsoft Exchange 2000 Server? If you’re an experienced Exchange 5.5
administrator, with some Active Directory know-how, this book (and accompanying
CD-ROM) should prove helpful, despite a few shortcomings.
The book’s strongest points are its accuracy and thoroughness. Clawson
and Luckett demonstrate knowledge of Exchange that comes from both detailed
research and experience. For example, they avoid the common pitfall of
assuming disaster recovery procedures for Exchange 2000 haven’t changed
from Exchange 5.5 (they have—big time). The chapters correspond to the
main exam topics, and are divided into “Certification Objectives” which
map each section to items in Microsoft’s exam prep guide. And although
the book’s main goal is exam preparation, it contains a lot of useful,
real-world information as well, such as which version of RAID is best
for Exchange and why.
Still, the authors omit a handful of relevant facts and capabilities,
such as how to create Administrative Groups before installing your first
Exchange server. Still, they can be forgiven a few lapses on such a big
topic; the book covers about 95 percent of what you need to know for the
exam.
The folks at Osborne get high marks for the features they include in
their MCSE prep books, and Clawson and Luckett make great use of them.
They emphasize the importance of hands-on experience and reinforce it
throughout the book with step-by-step lab exercises. The book also includes
“Two-Minute Drills” at the end of each chapter—handy stuff for a quick
review the night before the exam. Best of all are the “Self-Test Questions,”
which include not only answers but also explanations of them. I found
the questions very challenging, too (and no, I’m not telling you how I
did on them).
If the book has a weak point, it’s the organization; it’s good, but it
could have been better. Chapter 1, in particular, attempts to provide
an overview of Exchange 2000’s new features and procedures, but the chapter
confuses more than it informs. Skip it and go straight to Chapter 2. The
other chapters are much better organized, but still suffer occasional
lapses. For example, when the authors cover Address Lists, the “Exam Watch”
tips in the section discuss mail-enabled groups: an unrelated feature,
but the proximity implies they’re one and the same.
Although it includes several features, the accompanying CD wouldn’t be
my main reason for buying the book. The best part of the CD is “ExamSim,”
a challenging exam simulation. ExamSim tracks your score each time you
use it, helping you zero in on the topics you most need to study. Other
parts of the CD are somewhat lackluster. The hypertext version of the
book needs a search feature to be really useful, and the “Certcam” multimedia
demos, while moderately useful, are no replacement for hands-on practice.
Overall, anyone upgrading his or her Exchange 5.5 certification to Exchange
2000 will find this book useful. Just remember to skip the first chapter,
and supplement your reading—as always and as the authors themselves emphasize—by
working with the product.
About the Author
Ronald Stewart, MCSE+I, MCT, is an IT consultant in Vancouver, Canada. He has more than 10 years of experience in IT. He’s worked with, consulted on, and taught DNS.