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Title: Physical Chemistry: A Molecular Approach
ISBN: 0935702997
Author:
Donald A. McQuarrie
John D. Simon
Publicate Date: 1997-07
Publish: 1997-07
List Price: $99.00
Average Customer Rating: 4.5
Format: Hardcover
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Amazon Lowest New Price: $65.95
Amazon Lowest Used Price: $70.95
Amazon Merchant Price: $79.20
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| Customer Review: |
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1: Pchem
It's great. It's quite in depth, though you have to accept some parts of the math if you don't already know differential equations.
It's understandable even to me, and the last chem course I took was just AP, but it's also very challenging and in depth. Highly recommend.
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2: Who could I turn to?
For those students who are REQUIRED to derive everything on their PCHM exams, THIS IS THE BOOK FOR YOU! Excellent supplement to that weak and required text book of yours, for sure. Good luck! PCHMI (Thermo-C) PCHMII (Q. Mechanics-B)
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3: A Third-Rate Book at Best
This is one of the poorest textbooks I've ever owned. It is wordy yet it explains very little. And there is one really annoying aspect to this book:
The authors only ever introduce an equation once in the text. From thereon, they refer to that equation as "equation 17-1" or whatever number they designate it. So you're constantly having to turn back pages and entire chapters just to find out what stupid equation they are talking about. They also embed all the important tables within random chapters instead of being in an appendix, so good luck finding any constants or any other figures that would be put in a table.
Another bad thing about this book is that they made an update to it and added two chapters but didn't change the ISBN. So some people get the newer version with the correct number of chapters and some people will pay the same price for the book missing at least 2 chapters that they will need in their p-chem class (this happened to my girlfriend who has the older book and I have the newer one and we didn't discover this until the fourth test!). I hate this book with a passion. It has crappy black and white illustrations,and instead of writing fractions like ft/sec or mol/L they write ft*sec(-1) and mol*L(-1) and it gets quite distracting when they have several terms in the denominator. It looks like it was written in the 70's. I will say as a side-note that it's very much worth getting the solutions manual if you get this book. The solutions manual is pretty well-done.
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4: Physical Chemistry: A Molecular Approach
I received the correct book in excellent condition (matching the seller's description) in the timeframe I was told when I purchased it.
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5: Setting the standard for other physical chemistry texts
To be succinct:
1) Thorough explanation of each subject.
2) Subjects broken down into manageable chapters.
3) Lots of worked problems.
4) Lots of problems at the end of each chapter.
5) Material presented in a logical, not necessarily historical, fashion.
6) Layout is generally superior to other texts (spacious, not cramped)
7) Get the solutions manual.
Bear in mind most schools teach thermodynamics and kinetics, followed by quantum chemistry. This methodology is merely a reflection of the order of discovery, and not because quantum chemistry necessarily builds on thermo or kinetics. This text teaches quantum first, followed by thermo and kinetics. It's more logical to teach quantum first, but you can jump right into traditional physical chemistry with this text.
Only recommendation:
The publisher should package the book with the solutions manual. I'm a big fan of solutions manuals and a student is somewhat hobbled without one.
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