Great article. I agree that some books can be a valuable reference, long after the exam. I bought the original SQL Server 7.0 Exam Cram (70-029) and it's still on my desk, I have yet to find a more concise reference for the basics.

OTOH the newer Exam Cram books (now pub. by Que) don't go deep enough - the one for MCTS (70-431) is very superficial and doesn't cover all the exam objectives. Instead, I'm trying to get through the Sybex MCTS book which covers the basics, plus all the new 2005 features which are certain to be on the exam. I just hope I get around to sitting for the exam before Katmai 🙂

In my experience, MS certification exams are written to be difficult and tricky, making the cert worth more IMHO. I've passed the MCSD series for VB6, and the .NET solution architectures (70-300) but with each exam they became more difficult as MS tries to separate the brain-dump-memorizers from those who really know their stuff. As others have said, there is no substitute for hands-on experience.