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"Never commit to memory anything that is easily looked up in a book." Albert Einstein.

For those of you who watch what you eat, here's the final word on nutrition and health. It's a relief to know the truth after all those conflicting nutritional studies. 1. The Japanese eat very little fat and suffer fewer heart attacks than Americans. 2. The Mexicans eat a lot of fat and suffer fewer heart attacks than Americans. 3. The Chinese drink very little red wine and suffer fewer heart attacks than Americans. 4. The Italians drink a lot of red wine and suffer fewer heart attacks than Americans. 5. The Germans drink a lot of beers and eat lots of sausages and fats and suffer fewer heart attacks than Americans. CONCLUSION Eat and drink what you like. Speaking English is apparently what kills you.

That was the most valuable lesson I learned in graduate school. There are, of course, basics but it is often better to know where to find the exact information needed than recalling approximate information that may be outdated.

Here are the areas they test: http://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-utl/rtrptestspecifications.pdf While it is "open book" that only refers to Pub 17, the Form 1040 and the 1040 instructions. It doesn't refer to Circular 230. And there were several questions on that. (I took the test 4 months ago & don't remember the specific questions.) Also their versions of the Pub 17, etc. is in a different format than the one you can download from IRS. Same info, just different navigation. Not terribly exciting, but here's a link to a sample Prometric test - to get a feel for how the computer test works. It doesn't actually help with tax prep questions. http://www.prometric.com/clientfiles/irs/irsrp/index.htm I took the NATP test prep class and used their online sample tests for practice. I'm guessing those are only available to people who take the class, but I'm not sure about that. I found taking the sample tests to be very helpful in getting my brain back in a test taking mode. Good luck.