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- Verified Buyer
Most reviews of this product have been very positive, so you're probably wondering why mine is so negative.To put things into context, I had first bought the General Class manual - the companion volume to this, and loved it. My glowing review of that book and CD gave it five well deserved stars.So, massively encouraged by the General manual, and massively appreciative of how it helped me to pass the General license test, I eagerly ordered the Extra manual, expecting to see the same format and function as the General manual.Boy was I disappointed.Perhaps because this manual was written several years earlier, it is not nearly as good as the General manual, and doesn't have the same wonderful features making for such effective and directed learning.The General manual gives you in-text links to each relevant key point and ties them into the questions in the question pool. So you know exactly where to find the explanation you need for a particular question, and you know exactly which points of the manual you need to really focus on for exam purposes. The Extra manual does not do this. Instead, it merely tells you which questions are covered in each of its chapters, which is massively less useful.Is the ARRL deliberately making it harder to learn the content for the Extra class exam? Or was it just too much work for them to link the many more questions in the Extra pool into the text, the same as they did for the General manual and the fewer number of questions involved?The other disappointment related to the CD software. I'd loved the software that came with the General manual. But, alas, the Extra class software is not nearly as good.The biggest weakness with the Extra class software is that the explanations for each question/answer are not 'freestanding'. By that I mean regularly you'll find the answer to a question starts off by saying something like 'The same as in the previous question....' and requiring you to go back to the previous question to read the initial explanation contained there.Okay, so you might think that is no big deal. But it is a big deal if you're going through the questions randomly rather than sequentially - how do you get to the previous question in the sequential series if they are appearing randomly? You learn much better by going through the questions randomly, but the explanations often prevent you from doing this.Some of the explanations just made no sense at all - it was like they were cut off, with only the second half of the explanation appearing.So, to sum up : A manual that lacks the directed nature of presenting the information that is present in the General manual, and a CD that features cryptic and incomplete explanations. That's two thumbs down. I returned it.Lastly, a note : This review relates to the 9th edition of the manual, which covers the question pool that expires at the end of June 2012. If you do not plan to sit the exam until after 1 July 2012, you should not buy this manual, whether you think it great or not. Wait for the tenth edition, for the new question pool.I'm hoping the tenth edition will correct the shortcomings in this ninth edition, and be similar in format and quality to the current General manual. I'll write a review of that after it has come available, and really hope to be able to give it five stars rather than one!Two problems here, and I have passed the first two tests with the other books from ARRL. First, the book is essentially worthless, in my opinion, for passing the test. Most of the information is interesting and useful, but it is very difficult to get what you read to translate into the actual questions. In many cases, the book makes things worse in helping you understand what you are supposed to learn.The software, however, is fairly decent with one warning. It allows you to look at all the questions in any of the sections altogether or individually. More importantly, unlike some other "big name" packages, it keeps track of where you left off and allows you to flag particular questions so you can look at them again. This is massively helpful as you start to get some questions that you sort of know but you want to review. With over 700 questions, this is essential.HOWEVER, I have had no luck getting it to run in Win 7.So I can recommend the software, but only for old computers. And while the book is interesting and informative, you will likely never use it at all to pass the test.UPDATE: I finally got some very useful info from ARRL. They spent some time working on the problem after a number of ongoing complaints and the issue is an ongoing conflict with 64 bit ZoneAlarm. Remove ZA and replace with the 32 bit version and all is well. Thanks to ARRL for the efforts.I ordered this license review as part of my preparation for the extra-class exam It arrived on time as I paid for express shipping. The only problem was the book was out of date when I got it! The exam set expired 4 days before I got the copyIt turned out to not matter. I took the exam on July 14 and missed one question in 50 which would be an excellent score. I was denied the license becasue the examining station only had the old test. So it turned out that it did not matter that my review manual was shipped out of date.The extra class test has a published pool of 800 questions.The manual itself was well written and it is annodated for the questions. In many ways this is a better review that hamtestonline.com because the ARRL book is the right depth for preparation for the exam. The internet site will get your ready for the exam quicker, however. I recommend a combination of the two. Read the ARRL book first then spend 2-3 weeks on the internet site.When I retake my 'failed' exam in a couple of months I'll get the up to date version. It is good for 3 years. I recommend it and most of the other ARRL books that I've bought over the years.This is no light weight study guide; it is comprehensive on those topics covered by the Extra Class License exam. One of the features I like the best is that this license manual serves well as a reference book long after the exam is over. Another plus is the included CD containing practice exam software. Concerning the software, it is also a minus on the following point - ARRL needs to recognize that many hams prefer and use Mac computers and would therefore make a Mac version of the software.Another very important feature is this manual contains the complete exam question pool - 738 question - all indexed and cross-referenced to the text covering the exam question topic. I use qrz.com for doing the practice tests, and when I miss a question, I can easily find the topic in the manual and clear up any confusion I may have over the "correct" answer.I have a growing collection of books and manuals published by ARRL. They are quality books both in physical construction and certainly in content.Haven't got very far yet, but I passed my Tech and General in only 6 weeks total after using these books.I think this could make a difference.BE SURE YOU GET A CURRENT EDITION.Eleventh (11th) Edition is current as I write. 9th ED, is only for general info.Un bel riferimento per l'esame Extra Class.Da conservare per una eventuale rilettura, molti capitoli sono ben approfonditi e non mancano i riferimenti sia teorici sia pratici.Attenzione solamente alla versione! Questa versione include il software di simulazione degli esami valido solamente fino al 30 giugno 2012!!
