New Wiley/Elan Guides

CFA Level II
#21

Looks like the next best option is you can copy the text into Word and print from there but you lose some of the formatting.

#22

Thanks Jounin. I appreciate.

#23

Are the practice problems not available in any format until Feb 2014? or are problems available in electronic format now? please clarify on this…

This would be a major inconveniance to wait till Feb to start answering questions

#24

Most of the practice questions are there, only sections that are “new” (like Fixed Income) don’t have practice questions until February. Basically the same areas that don’t have readings yet don’t have practice problems, but probably 80% of the cirriculum is there

#25

Confusion.

So if all 56 readings are available via vitalsource today shouldn’t all practice problems be available as well?

#26

Not all the readings are available right now (you can click on the ones that are missing but it just says “available December 2014”). Here are the readings NOT available (I am typing this as I go through the book in vitalsource): 1, 2, 20, 25, 28, 29, 33, 34, 35, 36, 37, 42, 43, 44, 46

I spoke too soon with regards to the practice questions, there are more practice questions missing than the above readings but not much more. You could still work on half the cirriculum now and then start on the rest when they update later.

I question how fast they will ship printed books to people if the digital version of the readings are only ready in December. And their videos seem to follow their study book readings although I have only briefly watched one but it seems like you would want to follow the videos with the printed text in front of you to make notes. My only complaint is they’ve made printing the books out of vitalsource a real pain in the ass.

#27

thanks Bobby Braveheart - looks like I’m going to go with Schweser this year. Don’t want to have to track down missing readings and practice questions with their shoddy customer support and printing schedules. maybe i’m thinking too much into the elan vs schweser debate

#28

Thank-you everyone for the information. I used Elan last year and did like the books, however I was unable to write the exam and so I am retaking LII this year. I was not sure if I would use them again this year as I was pretty unhappy with the shipping schedule and their horible website (the wiley site does seem much better). I was on the fence, but based on the feedback here, I think I will stick to the CFAI books and buy some sort of question bank instead.

I have the Elan from last year (2014 exam) and Scheweizer for the 2013 exam [Band 10 fail, :-(], if I need a topic explained differently I have many books available :-p (except for the new/changed topics, but that is not a majority).

Good luck to everyone !

#29

I had schweser last year (band 8 fail) and I thought their materials were pretty good except some sections they don’t cover in enough detail. Their weekly video class was good for someone like me who passed L1 in december and only started studying in february so it helped provide me a study framework, however if you’re starting to study now (as you should) then those weekly video classes would be somewhat useless as they only cover the main topics which you should already know by then if you want to pass. Their three day final video review was also somewhat useless in my opinion. I thought schwesers best product was the video library that covers every LOS, I got alot out of that.

Elans videos look to be pretty in depth at 110 hours of video it is nearly 3 times the schweser video length. I look forward to seeing what the Elan products have to offer but in the end you need to make sure you can do every blue box and EOC from the CFAI books blindfolded if you want to pass. The prep providers should only be used as support in learning the material but I wouldn’t trust them when it comes to practicing.

#30

I wasn’t even planning on relying on the videos as I learn the most from reading and practicing, so for me it’s either kaplan’s guides with q-bank or elan guides notes (with videos if needed) and their practice problems. Elan seems a tad better but I don’t know if it’s worth risking my studies on their untimeliness of materials as proven in the past. I do all EOC questions and with L1 felt like I needed more topic based practice questions (passed L1 without Q-bank)

#31

A little bit annoyed with Elan. No Print text available. Even worse, you can only print 2 pages at a time from the Ebook. Customer service also sucks. Most of the answers I got from them were literally “Don’t Know”

#32

I feel quite misled.

I bought the full Wiley Elan L2 package. And was hugely disappointed to see massive amounts missing from the material. Virtually all of equity and major parts of other areas. To learn that they will not be available until December is shocking. I had specifically asked the help desk and she said eerything is availble from Sept 1.

Hate the fact it is on vitalsource as well. VS is pile of s**t. Feeling aggrevated.

#33

Can anyone confirm whether on Schweser all the material is present even if it is only Ebook format?

#34

Would also like to know if all schweser material is available and if so why it takes Elan so long to get their s**t together

#35

I’ve tried everything and can’t find a better way to print the elan guides except for printing two at a time, even copy paste to a word document limits you to two pages being copied and pasted and then you lose the formating. Nothing more annoying than VitalSource

#36

I also don’t understand why Elan is missing almost all of equity as the LOS’s haven’t changed, only some of the examples have changed in the CFAI cirriculum but from what I can see the content you need to learn is identical to last year

#37

Here’s what Schweser told me once I made my order SchweserNotes Volumes 1-5 & Quicksheet Kit (Printed) Est. Availability: 11/18/2014 Schweser Online Resource Library Est. Availability: 10/30/2014 SchweserPro QBank (Online) Est. Availability: 10/28/2014 Practice Exams Volume 1 (Printed with Online Performance Tracker) Est. Availability: 11/18/2014 Weekly Class Workbooks (Printed) Est. Availability: 1/7/2015 Secret Sauce (Printed) Est. Availability: 1/7/2015 Review Workshop Workbooks (Printed) Est. Availability: 3/6/2015

#38

So I have messed around with printing and converting to PDF’s from vital source today and here’s what I’m going to do. Whenever I try and print two pages at a time from my windows work computer it crashes, I couldn’t get a single thing to print and could also not save to PDF properly. At home I have a mac that seems to let me save to PDF two pages at a time from each reading, so I am saving each reading two pages at a time in PDF, then will merge those PDF’s into one PDF for each reading and then I can print from there. Once I got the saving to PDF system down it goes quite fast to save everything, I did two readings in about 10 minutes. Is this ideal? No. Based on what I’ve seen so far in the books is it worth it? Yes, the Elan notes seem to be better laid out, especially for someone like myself that is retaking this year, compared with schweser. It’ll be interesting to see how it goes watching the videos while following along with the notes as the videos seem to be quite long.

#39

Here is what Wiley replied to me about printing the material:

“Unfortunately, at the moment you will only be able to print 2 pages at a time through Vital Source. We are working with them to give students the ability to print all pages. This should be resolved with the next week or two. Thank you for your patience”

I hope they solve this fast, otherwise it’s just misleading advertising.

#40

I hope this is correct, here is what they told me on their chat service this morning (I actually can’t believe that they told me this)

Please wait for a site operator to respond.

You are now chatting with ‘Eileen’

Eileen: Hello!

you: Hi

you: I have a question regarding the Elan Guide for Level 2 CFA

you: I have the guide downloaded through VitalSource and I’m trying to print it but it will only let me print 2 pages at a time, how can I print an entire reading at once?

Eileen: You can only print 2 pages per day

you: So it won’t be possible to print an entire reading at one time? I don’t think I could print all the materials before the exam in June at 2 pages per day haha

Eileen: Correct

you: That is brutal, is there a reason for this? It’s a huge inconvenience

Eileen: Is there anything else I can help you with?