I decided to get back into shape besides being round. I have a little home gym that has the basics, like bench, legs, pull downs, and 2 barbells that can hold any amount of weight I slide onto it. I found a nifty little website that gives alot of barbell exercises

Dumbbell Exercises Complete with Animated Diagrams

I have the technique of each exercise down but I'm a bit confused on the sets and reps. When I was in high school, our PE teacher made us do 3 sets of reps, with 10 reps of 80% of max weight, 9 reps of 85% max, and 8 reps of 90% of max and this rule applied to all stations (bench, curls, legs, etc) but now it seems like most people at the gym that are doing weight training for weight loss are doing 3 sets of 8-10 reps of the same weight each time. Now which way is better while one is in a hypocaloric state? or are both equally as good? Thanks!